14 DAY TRIAL // Without an actual, full-fledge CEO, no company can really set up, and by extension follow, any sort of long-term plan, so it stands to reason that AMD should hurry up and choose a new chief, something that, apparently, might finally happen soon.
AMD's previous Chief Executive Officer ended up leaving office about two months ago, and with an interim chief at the reins, the sooner the company gets someone with a clear and solid long-term strategy, the better.
Dirk Meyer resigned in early January, presumably because his strategy involving mobile devices, like tablets, didn't satisfy the members of the board.
This may or may not come as a surprise, considering that, while mobile strategy is important, the shorter term depends more on the Fusion APUs as well as new CPUs, marketing-wise.
Meanwhile, Thomas Seifert has held the seat of interim chief executive, him being the previous chief financial officer.
It was originally hypothesized that the new CEO may come from the Sunnyvale, California-based company's server division, but this will most likely not happen. The reason is that several executives in such division resigned soon after Meyer did .
Overall, it is hard to say just who will pick up the mantle of leadership, although speculations have, of course, arisen.
One candidate, so to speak, is Rock Bergman, who joined AMD's staff after the acquisition of ATI Technologies.
James Lederer (form Qualcomm) and Pat Gelsinger (originally of EMC Corp.) are two other possible nominees.
Either way, the CPU, GPU and APU maker appears to be doing its best to ensure that whoever ends up on the leading seat is the best possible option.
“We believe that the company has a good selection of candidates lined up and that an announcement will be made relatively soon," said Romit Shah, a chip analyst with Nomura Securities.