Samsung hires a former Nvidia employee, could be developing its own GPU

Samsung already builds a crazy range of products, everything from washing machines and refrigerators to solid state drives and NAND flash memory chips. Rumor has it the company will add in-house GPUs to the mix as well.

Jon Peddie, the prominent analyst and president of Jon Peddie Research, notes that Samsung recently hired Dr. Chien-Ping Lu, also known as CP, to manage the company's GPU development. CP is an interesting hire, having served as Nvidia's senior architecture manager from 2007 to 2011 and senior director of MediaTeck (2011-2015) and Intel (2015-2016).

According to Peddie, Samsung is actively filling out its engineering teams in hardware, software, and a few other sectors, all of which are related to GPUs. The recent addition of CP is to take the company's home-brewed GPU across the finish line.

"When you take powerhouse company like Samsung, with the biggest and best fabs, the biggest and fastest memory devices, a consumer product group that sells smartphones that cause Apple too many sleepless nights, and add a breakthrough GPU design, the first new GPU design in over a decade, the confluence of capabilities is nothing short of breath taking," Peddie says.

Whatever GPU Samsung is rumored to have designed would more than likely be a mobile part. Along those lines, another rumor points to Samsung developing a gaming phone to compete with the Razer Phone, Asus ROG Phone, and Xiaomi Black Shark. A prominent leaker has also pegged Samsung as building its Galaxy S10 around its own GPU.

The question is, would Samsung stop there? Peddie brings up the possibility of Samsung extending its GPU play into other markets, including TVs, game consoles, and yes, even PCs.

Samsung isn't saying anything, of course, but taking on the likes of AMD and Nvidia is not out of the realm of possibility. Just ask Intel, which recently assembled a graphics team dedicated to developing discrete graphics.

Paul Lilly

Paul has been playing PC games and raking his knuckles on computer hardware since the Commodore 64. He does not have any tattoos, but thinks it would be cool to get one that reads LOAD"*",8,1. In his off time, he rides motorcycles and wrestles alligators (only one of those is true).

Latest in Graphics Cards
Nvidia App
Hmmm, upgrades: Nvidia App gets an optional AI assistant and custom DLSS resolution scaling
A close-up photo of an Nvidia RTX 4070, with its heatsink removed, showing the AD104 GPU die and the surrounding Micron GDDR6X VRAM chips
With Nvidia Ace taking up 1 GB of VRAM in Inzoi, Team Green will need to up its memory game if AI NPCs take off in PC gaming
A collage of Radeon RX 9000 series graphics cards, as shown in AMD's promotional video for the launch of RDNA 4 at CES 2025
AMD's CEO claims 9070 XT sales are 10x higher than all previous Radeon generations but that's just for the first week of availability
Colorful iGame RTX 5070 Ti Vulcan OC graphics card from various angles
The RTX 5060 and RTX 5060 Ti are rumoured to be mere weeks away, with board partners reportedly required to ensure at least one MSRP model at launch
Nvidia headquarters
Nvidia CEO sets sights on making 'several hundred billion' dollars worth of electronics in the USA over the next four years, increasing the chance of your next GPU being made in America
The Asus ROG Astral GeForce RTX 5090 Dhahab Edition, a gold-plated graphics card on a sand dune background
A Jensen Huang-signed version of this golden Asus RTX 5090 will be auctioned off to support relief efforts for the California wildfires
Latest in News
Monster Hunter Wilds' stockpile master studying a manifest
As layoffs and studio closures continue to deathroll the western AAA industry, analyst points out 5 of 8 major Japanese companies hit all-time share prices this year
A woman wearing a VR headset with dramatic, colourful lighting across the background
'World’s smallest LEDs' could lead to accurately lit screens with 127,000 pixels per inch and much more immersive VR
The NES themed 8BitDo Retro mechanical gaming keyboard on a blue background
I love the 8BitDo Retro C64 keyboard but I'd pick its cheaper NES-themed model near its lowest price ever during Amazon's Big Spring Sale
gta 6 trailer
Publishers 'don't want to be anywhere near' Grand Theft Auto 6 when it launches: 'It's proving to be very stressful'
Microsoft's iconic Bliss wallpaper
From pixels to pinot: The Windows XP 'Bliss' wallpaper hill was real and this is what it looks like now
A female Zoi making two hearts with her fingers.
Following 24 hours of Denuvo-based backlash, Inzoi is taking a surprising step and removing it entirely: 'We want to sincerely apologise for not aligning more closely with player expectations'