Lisa Su is now CEO of AMD

[mrmt]

The immediacy of the replacement, coupled with the near-zero heads-up in communications to shareholders, combined with the fact they provided no such cover as "leaving for personal reasons" goes towards supporting the theory that he was unceremoniously fired in all but name only.

That's my understanding too. Only something very grave, urgent and something that Rory wouldn't want to bring any attention would fit the "personal reasons" hypothesis.

My guess is the BoD probably felt like they have been listening to the same excuses for three years now as to why AMD can't turn a consistent profit, continues to see YoY revenue decreasing, etc. and concluded that after 3 years of this kind of "progress" that a fourth year under Rory would probably be no better.

The fact is, he delivered what he said he would deliver to the shareholders, or at least a good part of it. He shrunk the company, he brought the company to break even, and that was what he was asked to do in the first place. That points us to another direction, that he failed to deliver the internal milestones or results of the R&D or business pipeline.

So far they didn't disclose additional semi-custom clients they were supposed to disclose this year, but the money they were talking wasn't big, so I doubt that that would be the root cause for his firing. But what if they screwed up again with their R&D pipeline? They launched the demo for their ARM chip but are very tight regarding performance or performance/watt, and that's not good. If the product was good they ought to be telling customers how good it is, instead they slap customers with a NDA. If he screwed up again and messed up with the business case of the ARM line up, that would be big enough to oust him. And that's what I think that fired him.

 

[Rvenger]

Seems that Lisa has a good technical background looking at her LinkedIn profile and some other sources I found with a simple search. Maybe she will allocate more money to R&D which seems to be the weak link of AMD. Spin off the graphics unit and focus on those CPUs!

 

[NostaSeronx]

Spin off the graphics unit and focus on those CPUs!

AMD needs both CPU teams and GPU teams to be successful.

There has been research that CISC GPGPU architectures when running x86 has implicated improved performance. So, the fusing of the teams rather spinning off is the best route. Buying ATI has two benefits the next big x86/x86-64 microarchitectual change(long-term) and GPUs(short-term).

 

[Phynaz]

The immediacy of the replacement, coupled with the near-zero heads-up in communications to shareholders, combined with the fact they provided no such cover as "leaving for personal reasons" goes towards supporting the theory that he was unceremoniously fired in all but name only.

My guess is the BoD probably felt like they have been listening to the same excuses for three years now as to why AMD can't turn a consistent profit, continues to see YoY revenue decreasing, etc. and concluded that after 3 years of this kind of "progress" that a fourth year under Rory would probably be no better.

Still, he was far better for the company than either of his two predecessors, so he'll probably be stepping out of the company with a silly good golden parachute.

I feel it's all about the numbers. You put the CFO in charge when the numbers aren't working. My opinion is the 3Q numbers are going to bad, followed by large layoffs.

Either that or she sold herself as the maker of what progress has occurred so far. Political back room dealings with BOD members.

Either way, I'll bet a dollar Rory didn't know he was resigning when he woke up this morning.

Now on to thinking about if it's worth the infraction to call out the members that were such big Rory fanboys :biggrin:

 

[monstercameron]

I feel it's all about the numbers. You put the CFO in charge when the numbers aren't working. My opinion is the 3Q numbers are going to bad, followed by large layoffs.

Either that or she sold herself as the maker of what progress has occurred so far. Political back room dealings with BOD members.

Either way, I'll bet a dollar Rory didn't know he was resigning when he woke up this morning.

Now on to thinking about if it's worth the infraction to call out the members that were such big Rory fanboys :biggrin:

I though we all atleast acknowledged that RR was doing a decent job?

 

[ikachu]

I feel it's all about the numbers. You put the CFO in charge when the numbers aren't working. My opinion is the 3Q numbers are going to bad, followed by large layoffs.

She's not the CFO, she's the COO.

 

[Abwx]

I though we all atleast acknowledged that RR was doing a decent job?

Most funny is that i didnt read so much doomness and gloomness when some well known CEO was abruptly ejected and also replaced by an enginering backround titled in house employee...

 

[jpiniero]

Stock is down after hours over 7%, so Wall Street shares the opinion that this is a bad sign for Q3.

I though we all atleast acknowledged that RR was doing a decent job?

What is AMD's real long term future? That's the issue I have. Virtually everything that made their money in the past has been overrun by Atom and Team China. The graphics business has been break even, but this is a time when the discrete business is declining.

She was the CFO right? Perhaps she is bringing brought in to bring AMD in for a soft landing.

 

[geoxile]

Stock is down after hours over 7%, so Wall Street shares the opinion that this is a bad sign for Q3.



What is AMD's real long term future? That's the issue I have. Virtually everything that made their money in the past has been overrun by Atom and Team China. The graphics business has been break even, but this is a time when the discrete business is declining.

She was the CFO right? Perhaps she is bringing brought in to bring AMD in for a soft landing.

No... Seriously, a simple google search would alleviate these questions. Devinder Kumar is the CFO. Lisa Su was the COO, pretty sure even the reports mentioned this

 

[Rvenger]

Lisa Su
Chief Operating Officer at AMD
Location Austin, Texas (Austin, Texas Area) Industry Semiconductors

The interesting question would be, will she stay in Austin or take the AMD jet to Sunnyvale? I really hope she stays in Austin.

 

[Phynaz]

She's not the CFO, she's the COO.

You're right, my bad.

 

[Phynaz]

I though we all atleast acknowledged that RR was doing a decent job?

Who is we all? I never did. He failed to meet targets multiple times.

 

[Abwx]

More (precise) news :

Update 5:01 PM: Now that the AMD conference call is over, we have a somewhat clearer sense of what unfolded today and why.

For starters, Read made it clear that Su has been groomed to succeed him as CEO from the start.

http://techreport.com/news/27180/updated-lisa-su-promoted-to-amd-ceo-as-rory-read-steps-down

 

[Vesku]

It actually makes sense to be planned or at least a pre-arranged, i.e. Read has known for at least a while, coup. If there is another round of cutting then it points to Su undermining Read with the BoD. On that note, not sure how AMD will improve execution times without running deep in the red unless another round of cuts are planned.

"Su also outlined her goals for AMD's future, which don't sound too different from those Read had already set. AMD's "highest priority" will be to "build great products," she said. The company will also seek to forge more "strategic relationships with market leaders" as it's already done with Sony and Microsoft for the current crop of consoles. Finally, Su said she will "continue to simplify the company and speed up [its] execution.""

I don't think there's much explanation for their A1100 product being delayed by 6-9 months, they were originally touting development kit shipments at the end of March this year, except the lack of funds to accelerate physical tape out. It uses standard ARM cores which ARM has designed and tested so you'd think a company like AMD could hit their roadmap as long as the funds are available. Unless Su as the COO strung some of the projects out a bit in clever ways and then blamed lack of funds, i.e. a coup. Or more positively, perhaps Carrizo is actually looking very good and so the BoD's confidence in Su eclipsed Read.

 

[mrmt]

"Su also outlined her goals for AMD's future, which don't sound too different from those Read had already set. AMD's "highest priority" will be to "build great products," she said. The company will also seek to forge more "strategic relationships with market leaders" as it's already done with Sony and Microsoft for the current crop of consoles. Finally, Su said she will "continue to simplify the company and speed up [its] execution."

Bingo

 

[monstercameron]

Bingo

any more commentary? is that a good thing or bad thing[or maybe that is too simple a question?]?

 

[Vesku]

He's saying more cuts are coming meaning Su most likely pushed out Read. Read explained the transition by saying it was always planned this way, he would cut and refocus then Su would step in. Such a claim starts to crack if more cuts are planned in the near future, as you'd still want Read at the helm under that plan.

 

[Ryan Smith]

I knew Rory's days were limited. I had a feeling. I wonder if Lisa Su is fit for the position.

Rory's job was to fix the company and find the next Jerry. I think he has done well in both regards. Lisa Su is an extremely capable person whom if she wasn't CEO at AMD, would eventually be the CEO at a similar technology company.

 

[TechFan1]

If he was forced to resign, maybe it has to do with gpus. AMD did just have to make cuts to there gpu prices, and it seems like they don't have anything to launch in the near future.

 

[mrmt]

any more commentary? is that a good thing or bad thing[or maybe that is too simple a question?]?

Lisa Su is saying that cuts are incoming, and soon. Simplifying the company is an euphemism for that. Second is that Lisa on the webcast did put emphasis on diversification (she called it a critical item, which means core business will suffer), that changes on prioritization of projects are also incoming (which means the old strategy wasn't sound), that the Microserver business will take time to mature (it was one of Rory's bet. Feldman's departure is now explained).

That is not an orderly transition to me, Rory was indeed fired.

 

[mrmt]

If he was forced to resign, maybe it has to do with gpus. AMD did just have to make cuts to there gpu prices, and it seems like they don't have anything to launch in the near future.

My guess is a problem on CPUs.

 

[Ajay]

If he was forced to resign, maybe it has to do with gpus. AMD did just have to make cuts to there gpu prices, and it seems like they don't have anything to launch in the near future.

My thinking was this^ was the final straw. It sure isn't a transitional plan

Rory Read, 52, who has stepped down as president and chief executive officer, and member of the board of directors...

If it was transitional, he would have stayed the BoD - what actually happened was a coup d'etat. In any case, interesting time ahead for AMD - again!

 

[Phynaz]

More (precise) news :



http://techreport.com/news/27180/updated-lisa-su-promoted-to-amd-ceo-as-rory-read-steps-down

Succession planning is announced well in advance. Read was fired, plain and simple.

 

[Abwx]

Succession planning is announced well in advance. Read was fired, plain and simple.

Lisa Su was recruited in January 2012, one does not come like this and be promoted CEO in a row without any previous experience of such a chair, at the time it is likely that the BoD estimated that she lacked experience managing a SP500 corporate, although she s Phd one cant negate that Rory Read had a much higher profile management wise

 

[Phynaz]

When did Read announce he was stepping down? Oh, wait, he didn't.

Maybe because English isn't your native language you are missing the nuance of the whole thing.