with just a little shy of 100 billion in the bank people have been asking what will apple do with it.  Buy AMD is an interesting option , apple has bought two smaller arm custom designers in the last 5 years, and has started increasing custom silicon more frequently again. the could use AMDs patent library to their advantage in a custom designed X86 core for the ipad, low power high end graphics, or as patent leverage in discussions with other custom cpu designers. If not an out right acquisition maybe become a subsidiary that acts autonomously with special interest to  apple projects. apple certainly has the cash on hand AMD needs to get back on its feet, and if AMD could deliver some custom hardware for use in apple computers it could give apple an advantage to laud of other tablet, ultra slim laptop makers. while pooling its arm talent to create a new juggernaut in the field.

im not saying it will happen, just saying its an interesting thought

edit, one of the reasons i thought about this is due to amds stock being down almost 50% from this time last year, and not a pretty outlook they need cash to give them time, and to grow some of their ideas, and right now they might just be a bargain 

What AMD does and what Apple do are far too different in my opinion.

Macbook airs would get better GPUs and worse CPUs?

Would it possibly be subject to anti trust / monopoly litigation to the extent that the amount of AMD / their patents Apple would have to give up would make it not worth it?

When you have enough money to buy a not so small country the problem become what can you buy that's actually worth buying but which doesn't run you afoul of anti trust and monopoly laws. I believe Greece is going cheap, but what does it have that Apple wants?

If only the company was genuinely free to put the money to good use they could do a shit load of good to alleviate 3rd world poverty, hunger and disease. But corporations aren't allowed to do that, they must solely concentrate on continuing to make ever increasing profits, even when they have 100 billion in the bank and nothing to spend it on.

I think buying nintendo would be a better option :D.

not that would happen or be allowed to happen.

You think Apple is the type of company that would want to anyway?

Hmm maybe. But I doubt to see it happen. And AMD's current CPUs just aren't good enough for all the Mac fanboys.

Apple was going to use Llano and then the cancelled it because AMD couldn't ship them enough and their roadmap in CPU performance terms wasn't good enough.

That actually sounds like a scary scenario he just played out in his head...

Apple love to buy IP companies, with very low number of workers. AMD has 11k workers, too much for Apple to swallow, IMO.