AMD RLC Plus Strategy: Speed-to-Market with Minimal Scope

Situation

Decided to prioritize speed-to-market for the RLC Plus AMD co-marketing launch. The initial build will use upstream AMD packages (pre-built ROCm), the kernel driver (not upstream DKMS), and enable EPEL. Deferring the more robust in-house rebuild until market traction is proven. Justin Haynes to draft proposal and decision matrix.

Reasoning

AMD partnership has a time-sensitive co-marketing window that requires fast delivery. RLC Plus is a self-supported product where the guarantee is installs and boots, not latest drivers. This is explicitly a two-way door decision - can always switch to upstream later if needed. Spending months on AMD rebuild before proving market fit would be wasteful given engineering resource constraints and 2x velocity mandate. Full-scope release requires months; minimal scope is achievable in 2 weeks.

Additional Context

Original Jan 30 target date was invalid because scope was undefined. AMD wants turnkey RLC+ build for MI-355 GPUs to support co-marketing partnership. Product (Brady) will present trade-off to AMD for their decision.

Observed Evidence

Engineering Weekly Sync summary: Decision - Prioritize speed-to-market for the RLC+ AMD co-marketing launch. Initial Build: Use the kernel driver, AMD pre-built ROCm packages, and enable EPEL. Rationale: This is the fastest path to a working product. A more robust, in-house rebuild will be considered if market traction warrants the investment.

Confidence Breakdown

Reasoning Depth Analysis