Intel hires AMD’s former Head of Graphics to launch high-end graphics business

US multinational technology firm Intel has poached Raja Koduri, the former Chief Architect of AMD’s Radeon Technologies Group, as it looks to launch its own high-end graphics solutions range.

In his new position, Koduri will head Intel’s new Core and Visual Computing Group, the business that will be dedicated to this venture, with Intel looking to rival the established names of Nvidia and AMD in the graphics card market.

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“I have admired Intel as a technology leader and have had fruitful collaborations with the company over the years,” Koduri said. “I am incredibly excited to join the Intel team and have the opportunity to drive a unified architecture vision across its world-leading IP portfolio that help’s accelerate the data revolution.”

Under Koduri’s leadership, Intel will expand its operations within the graphics, media, imaging and machine intelligence, AI and edge computing sectors.

“We have exciting plans to aggressively expand our computing and graphics capabilities and build on our very strong and broad differentiated IP foundation,” said Murthy Renduchintala, Intel’s Chief Engineering Officer. “With Raja at the helm of our Core and Visual Computing Group, we will add to our portfolio of unmatched capabilities, advance our strategy to lead in computing and graphics, and ultimately be the driving force of the data revolution.”

Off the back of the announcement, both AMD and Nvidia’s shares dropped by 5% and 1.8% respectively.