AMD CEO: 2026 marks the real year of AI inference

At the 2026 Open Compute Project Global Summit, AMD CEO Dr. Lisa Su expressed confidence in the future growth of the CPU market. She predicted that the global AI accelerator market in data centers will reach nearly $1.5 trillion by 2030, with CPU growth potential being even greater. Su noted that the CPU market was only about $20 billion a year ago, with a single-digit annual growth rate expected. With the rise of AI agents, Su believes CPU demand will see renewed growth, citing a 50% compound annual growth rate for the next 4 to 5 years, leading to a potential market size of over $2 trillion by 2030. Su referred to 2026 as the 'real year of AI inference,' forecasting that inference will account for about 60% of the market from this year onward. She also highlighted the explosive growth of AI agent workloads. AMD has started delivering Helios production systems since September, with initial deployments in data centers of major clients like OpenAI, Meta, Microsoft, Oracle, and Anthropic. Production is expected to scale up through the fourth quarter and into next year.