AMD today announced the first AMD Fusion Center of Innovation at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, to focus on the developer environment and software performance advancements enabled by heterogeneous computing.

The center will fund and promote new commercial enterprises emerging from the intellectual property and research expertise in the University of Illinois community. Through access to AMD Accelerated Processing Unit (APU) technology and platforms, the AMD Fusion Center of Innovation will help bridge access to new AMD heterogeneous computing technology with the spirit stimulated and nurtured on campus.

To kick-off the AMD Fusion Center of Innovation, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is offering a course aimed at kindling the spirit of entrepreneurship by bringing a mix of expert speakers to cover the specifics of AMD heterogeneous computing technology, while also providing how-to background on entrepreneurship, commercialization and start-up creation. This course will be offered by the university's College of Engineering, Technology Entrepreneur Center (TEC), as "ENG/TE 360/460: Lectures in Engineering Entrepreneurship AMD section."

At the completion of the course, students will submit projects, which will be evaluated for potential funding opportunities through the AMD Fusion Fund and IllinoisVENTURES.

AMD APU technology combines a multi-core CPU and discrete-level GPU and other hardware accelerators on a single power-efficient chip enabling user interface innovation, vivid HD entertainment and content creation, fast Internet browsing and accelerated media applications.