There were no signs of trouble this morning. AMD concise announced that after years of absence, Rick Bergman is returning to the ranks of the leadership, having seen the "best times" of AMD's graphics division immediately after the purchase of ATI Technologies assets. As a reminder, Bergman's responsibilities as AMD's executive vice president of Computing and Graphics will include overall leadership of the business to create products for the consumer market, graphics solutions and "custom" products. The latter, as we know, are undeniably popular with game console developers.
Resource finds reason to believe that the invitation of Rick Bergman to Lisa Su's "inner circle" is part of her own plan to prepare a successor. According to the source, the current CEO of AMD is preparing the ground for his "career growth" in the management structure of IBM Corporation. First, Lisa Su, allegedly, will take one of the closest posts to the current head of IBM, Ginni Rometty, and then replace her as chairman of the board of directors, president and CEO of the corporation. These businesswomen are united by a historical parallel - none of the fair sex has held top management positions in their companies before them. Rommety has been running IBM since January 2012, her career in the "blue giant" began back in 1981 as a systems engineer.
What ambitions can be guided by Lisa Su in pursuit of the status of the head of IBM, the source does not report. By itself, this information requires careful verification, and for sure, an immediate reaction from the official AMD press service will follow the publication of this news. According to WCCFTech, Rick Bergman will be given about 90 days to adapt as an executive vice president of AMD, and Lisa Su will leave her post this fall. If she really does this, then the moment has been chosen in terms of business reputation - AMD has achieved considerable success under her leadership, releasing three categories of advanced 2019βnm products in 7 at once: central processing units for personal computers and servers, as well as graphics solutions for gaming segment of the Navi generation. At a pinch, the Radeon VII could also be among this year's 7nm releases, though the lifecycle of this rare graphics card promises to be unprecedentedly short.
With the debut of 7nm Rome server processors this week, AMD will significantly strengthen its position in a segment where Intel has almost completely dominated in recent years. Such "preparation" for the transition to IBM for Lisa Su is also a favorable factor. It should be recalled that IBM and AMD have been collaborating for many years in the development of new lithographic technologies, and when AMD's production assets were transferred to GlobalFoundries, fruitful work continued. IBM even managed to sell its processor manufacturing businesses to GlobalFoundries. In recent years, however, this manufacturer began to get rid of assets, but this did not affect the relationship between IBM and AMD.
The authority of Lisa Su in the industry community has grown markedly in recent months. She was also recognized as one of the most influential business women of the year, and was appointed chairman of the GSA semiconductor manufacturers association, and many industry events without the presence of Lisa Su are already hard to imagine. For example, she was honored to open Computex 2019, and at this month's Hot Chips event, she will share the stage with TSMC's VP of Engineering to talk about trends in the semiconductor industry. The desire to move on and develop is quite natural for a leader of this level, so if the described intentions of the head of AMD are confirmed by the end of the year, this should not be surprised.
PS On your page in Lisa Su denied these rumors, confirming her loyalty to AMD. She promised that the most interesting is yet to come.
Source: 3dnews.ru