Ep. 43 | Mark Papermaster: The EE and Exec Behind Apple, IBM, Cisco, and AMD’s Success

Moore's Lobby: Where engineers talk all about circuits

The decades of perspective Mark Papermaster offers in this episode of Moore’s Lobby is something to pay attention to: from reminiscing on the early days of microprocessors to bringing the iPhone and iPod into the pockets of millions as humanity’s first “mini computers.” Papermaster provides a throwback to the epic AIM Alliance (Apple, IBM, and Motorola), a deep dive on AMD’s APU (accelerate processing unit), the breakdown of the buzz around designing “chiplets,” and how AMD learned to “punch above their weight” to take on competitors on who are 10X their size.

Are you one of those EEs who gets "religious about one approach versus another”? Papermaster may influence your philosophy as Host Daniel Bogdanoff aims to uncover why Mark won’t stop “preaching modularity” as it is “a critical facet of scale and goes back to the history of engineering innovation.” Other topics include the importance of specialists and multidisciplinary engineering teams working together to solve the toughest problems and the fun behind AMD’s high-performance processors.

You won’t want to miss Papermaster’s unfiltered stories on:

-The risk of redesigning AMD’s Zen architecture

-Hear why many attorneys tell Papermaster “he is famous” for a landmark legal case (IBM vs Papermaster (Apple)), followed by lots of laughter because “engineers do not care”

-What it’s like to be recruited by Steve Jobs

-Get his take on what makes a great chip designer

-How his current chapter as AMD’s CTO and EVP of Technology and Engineering are “the most exciting years of his life”

-How AMD’s acquisition of ATI Graphics and Xilinx has set them apart in the market

-And, make sure to listen until the end of the episode as Papermaster shares his opinion on the most crucial skill engineers need to have in their portfolio today