As we had reported earlier, the race to replace Rory Read as CEO between John Byrne and Lisa Su had been heating up for quite some time and now that race is over with today’s announcement. In today’s announcement, Dr. Lisa Su replaces the current CEO Rory Read who was more of a caretaker CEO for the company as they came out from the verge of collapse under the rule of Thomas Seifert.
According to a statement from AMD’s investor relations, Read will continue to be with AMD (NASDAQ:AMD) in order to support the transition in an advisory role, remaining with the company through the end of 2014. Su as we had previously indicated, was responsible for the company’s embedded and professional products but only held the role for a very short period of time until she became CEO. In fact, Su was the GM of Global Business units before she became in charge of that business group, which had already telegraphed that she might be in the running for CEO.
This is a continuation of the company’s restructuring as well as the first step in major restructuring this month that we had indicated late last week. Many changes are coming to AMD, and replacing Read is definitely a smart move by AMD’s board because the reality is that Su really gets the company’s products and markets. Read’s job was to keep the company moving forward and to grease the wheels as necessary and anyone that saw his role within the company could see that clearly. His days were numbered until someone like Su had been properly groomed for the position and understood how the business needs to be run from that position. In fact, much of what Su had done before inside AMD almost seemed like a mini-CEO position which may explain why her becoming CEO is not much of a shock to anyone.
Su is also AMD’s first female CEO and once again indicates the progress within the IT industry with some of the biggest companies like Oracle, IBM, HP and many more all being led by women. While the fact that Su is a woman should not affect the company or her performance whatsoever, it is a good thing for women as a whole in the tech industry so that there are no misconceptions about what a woman is capable of in tech.
Watch below as Su talks about her new position and the direction of the company.
