Looks like AMD has committed to moving to open source firmware for their products by 2026.
Would this mean that we could see an AMD product as a SoC in the future? 
That is not the main issue. The main issue is availability of compact system-on-modules.
I wonder if there’s an opportunity for the community to get an ODM to design a low-end AMD board with this?
TBH it’s probably easier to get someone to create a board based off the Reform motherboard (for the charging system) with a BGA and socketed RAM with some low-end Athlon Silver laptop chip onboard.
Chinese firms have full handheld systems based on these types of chips selling for as little as $400 per unit and that’s with a battery, screen, custom injection molded case etc.
One of the things that attracts me to mnts products in the first place is the fact that they’re not x86. X86 has too much baggage for a modern small computer anyway – the performance per watt isn’t better (on the low end) then arm, and since all the software I run is open source anyway id prefer arm (and hopefully riscV in the future)
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the other tricky bit is how much hotter some of the x86 stuff runs. even what you linked has a little fan in it! so then you’d also end up having to modify the case to have some kind of venting… it’s a big mess i reckon
Certainly. I was thinking that very little modification could be made, but 2 seperate vents could be added to the rear wall of the case. This could allow and intake and an exhaust.
Honestly, I would prefer a fanless chip. AMD seems to mainly be getting wins through abundant power use, and that doesn’t translate well to passive cooling.
I think the Reform is pretty excellent as is. This would just mean more software compatibility.
Not to promote x86 but I have a neat little fanless Lenovo IdeaPad Duet 3i 10 with an intel N5030 (4c 1.1/3.1GHz), 8GB memory and 128GB eMMC.