Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ:AMD) is eager to make a name for itself in the artificial intelligence (AI) space. That’s not surprising, given that AI runs on processors and AMD’s primary stock in trade is processors. Thus, its recent purchase of Silo AI makes sense, and shares surged to match, up nearly 3% in Wednesday afternoon’s trading.
AMD dropped $665 million in cash to land the Finnish AI operation, which gives it access to a range of AI models that will hopefully help it close the gap with its competitors in the field. Silo AI considers itself the “largest private AI lab” in Europe and has a range of high-end clients to its credit. Clients that are now, by extension, AMD’s clients.
AMD won’t be making much in the way of changes, as it’s leaving Peter Sarlin—currently co-founder and CEO—in charge of the team, which will be part of the Artificial Intelligence Group at AMD. AMD’s recent line of processors—particularly the MI300—is set to be a major part of AMD’s bottom line, with some projections looking at about $4 billion in revenue.
A Bruiser in the Zen 5 Benchmarks
That’s a big step for AMD, but that’s not all it had. AMD also rolled out a new processor in benchmarking; a new Zen 5 processor with eight cores. The early benchmark tests on those eight-core versions in single-core testing suggest that it beats the Intel Core i9-14900KS by 4%. That by itself isn’t bad until you realize the Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) processor has 24 cores.
While the benchmarks didn’t do quite so well with multi-core testing, there was still a clear advance. The AMD processor was 8% faster than its previous version, but Intel’s 14900KS ran roughshod over it. That’s not surprising, given it packs 24 cores to AMD’s eight.
Is AMD a Buy, Sell, or Hold?
Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Strong Buy consensus rating on AMD stock based on 28 Buys and seven Holds assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. After a 64.27% rally in its share price over the past year, the average AMD price target of $190.71 per share implies 4.76% upside potential.
