Amazon’s Cloud Unit Has Designed a More Powerful Datacenter Chip

Amazon’s cloud computing unit has designed a second, more powerful generation of datacenter processor chip, Reuters reported Thursday, the latest sign that the e-commerce company is pouring money into custom silicon for its fastest-growing business. From a report: The new Amazon Web Services chip uses technology from SoftBank Group-owned Arm Holdings, the sources said. One of the sources familiar with the matter said it will be at least 20% faster than Amazon’s first Arm-based chip, named Graviton, which was released last year as a low-cost option for easier computing tasks. If Amazon Web Services’ chip efforts are successful, it could lessen the unit’s reliance on Intel and Advanced Micro Devices for server chips. In cloud computing, businesses rent out servers from Amazon instead of running their own datacenters. Analysts expect Amazon’s cloud unit to generate $34.9 billion in sales in 2019, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.