Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) appointed Lisa Su (蘇姿豐) as chief executive officer to replace Rory Read, swapping an executive who has stabilized the chipmaker’s finances for an engineer who will try to make its technology competitive.
The promotion of Su, 44, who had been chief operating officer, is effective immediately, the company said in a statement on Wednesday.
Read, 52, who is also stepping down from the board, will remain with AMD through the end of the year in an advisory role, the Sunnyvale, California-based company said. Read had been CEO since 2011.
AMD did not directly address why it was making a leadership change just a week before the company reports third-quarter earnings.
Reflecting the rushed nature of the announcement, AMD said in a filing that Su is still negotiating with the board on the terms of her new employment agreement and Read is still working out a separation agreement.
In the statement, chairman Bruce Claflin said Su’s semiconductor experience makes this “an ideal time for her to lead the company.”
Read had been working to turn around AMD, a chipmaker that has struggled to jump-start sales growth.
While the company rearranged debt and cut costs through job reductions under Read, it continued to lose market share in PC processors against Intel Corp.
AMD’s revenue growth is projected to be a percentage in the single digits through 2016, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Read said on a conference call on Wednesday that there was no disagreement behind the change and that he was aligned with the board on the decision.
“I look at it as a natural move here,” Read said. “She’s a semiconductor professional. She loves this space.”
AMD stock fell as much as 7.3 percent in extended trading after closing at US$3.28 in New York on Wednesday.
The stock is down 15 percent this year. AMD has a market capitalization of US$2.5 billion.
“The timing of it seems weird,” said Sanford C. Bernstein & Co analyst Stacy Rasgon, who has the equivalent of a sell rating on the stock.
Su “is probably thought better of than Rory by Wall Street at this time,” because of her more open communication style compared with Read, Rasgon said.
Su, who joined AMD in 2012 and is the first female CEO of a major chip company, is an engineer who held technical positions at International Business Machines Corp, Motorola Inc spinoff Freescale Semiconductor Ltd and Texas Instruments Inc.
She has a doctorate, master’s and bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Su joined AMD in 2012 and inherits some of Read’s initiatives that have paid off.
Sony Corp and Microsoft Corp have both based their newest video-game consoles on AMD chips.
In PCs, AMD has lost sales and trailed Intel in updating its product lineup with better-performing processors.
The two companies are the only remaining makers of processors that are the main components of PCs. Intel has more than 80 percent of that market, according to researcher IDC.
“We won’t transform the company overnight,” Su said.
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