diff --git a/meta/conf/bitbake.conf b/meta/conf/bitbake.conf
index 0bcc8215c5d..69e854ecedc 100644
--- a/meta/conf/bitbake.conf
+++ b/meta/conf/bitbake.conf
@@ -975,5 +975,5 @@ BB_UNIHASH ?= "${BB_TASKHASH}"
 oe.sstatesig.find_sstate_manifest[vardepsexclude] = "BBEXTENDCURR BBEXTENDVARIANT OVERRIDES PACKAGE_EXTRA_ARCHS"
 oe.utils.get_multilib_datastore[vardepsexclude] = "DEFAULTTUNE_MULTILIB_ORIGINAL OVERRIDES"
 oe.path.format_display[vardepsexclude] = "TOPDIR"
-oe.utils.multiprocess_launch[vardepsexclude] = "BB_NUMBER_THREADS"
+oe.utils.get_bb_number_threads[vardepsexclude] = "BB_NUMBER_THREADS"
 oe.packagedata.emit_pkgdata[vardepsexclude] = "BB_NUMBER_THREADS"
diff --git a/meta/lib/oe/utils.py b/meta/lib/oe/utils.py
index 1658f3555d3..a3b1bb1087d 100644
--- a/meta/lib/oe/utils.py
+++ b/meta/lib/oe/utils.py
@@ -264,10 +264,17 @@ def execute_pre_post_process(d, cmds):
         bb.note("Executing %s ..." % cmd)
         bb.build.exec_func(cmd, d)
 
-# For each item in items, call the function 'target' with item as the first 
+def get_bb_number_threads(d):
+    return int(d.getVar("BB_NUMBER_THREADS") or os.cpu_count() or 1)
+
+def multiprocess_launch(target, items, d, extraargs=None):
+    max_process = get_bb_number_threads(d)
+    return multiprocess_launch_mp(target, items, max_process, extraargs)
+
+# For each item in items, call the function 'target' with item as the first
 # argument, extraargs as the other arguments and handle any exceptions in the
 # parent thread
-def multiprocess_launch(target, items, d, extraargs=None):
+def multiprocess_launch_mp(target, items, max_process, extraargs=None):
 
     class ProcessLaunch(multiprocessing.Process):
         def __init__(self, *args, **kwargs):
@@ -302,7 +309,6 @@ def multiprocess_launch(target, items, d, extraargs=None):
             self.update()
             return self._result
 
-    max_process = int(d.getVar("BB_NUMBER_THREADS") or os.cpu_count() or 1)
     launched = []
     errors = []
     results = []