AMD CFO Thomas Seifert quits
AMD's Thomas Seifert has handed in his resignation as the company's chief financial officer, continuing a high-level brain drain at the company spanning half a decade.
AMD confirmed late last night that it had received Seifert's resignation as the once-and-former CFO looked to 'pursue other opportunities' outside the company. 'We thank Thomas for his many contributions to AMD and for serving as interim CEO in 2011,' AMD president and chief executive Rory Read claimed in a statement to press. 'Thomas' personal commitment to the highest standards of accountability and financial integrity has helped define how AMD does business today.'
Devinder Kumar, senior vice president and corproate controller at the company, is to take over Seifert's role in the interim while a more permanent replacement is found. 'Devinder is an experienced financial executive,' Read added, 'whose financial expertise and semiconductor experience developed during his 28 year tenure at AMD is an asset to the company.'
Seifert joined AMD in 2008, and was made interim chief executive officer for a brief period following Dirk Meyer's resignation back in January 2011. Meyer wasn't the only one to leave the company: since 2007, AMD has been experiencing something of a exodus of high-level executives, with Meyer going the way of his predecessor Hector Ruiz alongside Henri Richard, Dave Orton, Phil Hester, and more recently graphics guru Bob Feldstein.
AMD has claimed in a statement that Seifert's departure is on good grounds, with no hint of disagreement over the company's accounting principles or any recent financial statement disclosures.
AMD's announcement comes on the same day as OCZ Technology confirmed that its founder and chief executive Ryan Petersen would be leaving the company, replaced in the interim by chief marketing officer Alex Mei.
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Discuss in the forums ReplyRats leaving a sinking ship?.
Of course, there are a whole host of other possibilities, but when it comes to AMD, people always seem to jump to the worst option (not without some justification, given how pants Phenom I and Bulldozer were/are...)
Thing is, all the non-Intel x86 chipmakers were always chasing after Intel. AMD is the only one who survived to create their own brand in a good light (thanks to Athlon Thunderbird, Athlon XP and Athlon 64). With Intel's Pentium 4 'misstep' AMD had a chance to get ahead, which they did... then floundered - not entirely their own fault, Intel had a lot of power over the big OEMs, Microsoft were very slow to get an x64 OS out, and then it was poorly supported... but anyway, the point is AMD are back in their old place of 'catching up' to Intel.
A CFO is only is basically responsible for cashflow and signing off investments (amongst many, many other things), but hey, what company need money? ;)
Who are all these 'non-Intel x86 chipmakers' you speak of? As far as I'm aware, the only other x86 licensee was Cyrix, which lives on through Via. And Via's never chased Intel - their markets are pretty fundamentally different. Not sure about Cyrix, but Via, as far as there x86 business goes, are deep in embedded markets and industrial control. They have their little forays into the consumer space, but they could likely give that up without feeling much pain. I find some of their boards mightily tempting (pico-ITX) but the cost is prohibitive for what you get.
I don't know that there's a whole lot to this - for all we know, he really dug being CEO and was hoping to take back the crown. Once he thought it was clear that wasn't going to happen, he bailed. Maybe he's got a sick kid or wife. Anyway, he was the CFO. Tell me if AMD's head of engineering has split, then I'll sweat. Not going to lie awake at night because they lost their head beancounter.
Allow me to highlight a rather important link from the article you appear to have missed: AMD's chief technology officer steps down. As the article states, Seifert's departure is merely the latest in a stream of top-level executive losses going back half a decade - and if you don't care about the chief financial officer, perhaps the loss of the chief technology officer warrants a raised eyebrow or two?
Exactly. A CFO is a little bit more than an 'accountant.'
When you're losing more high-level people than you're hiring, it's indicative of a problem - and when it continues for half a decade, it's indicative of a serious problem. Mind you, there's no need to take my word for it: the news of Seifert's departure has led investors to drop AMD in droves, with the company's share price currently sitting down by almost 10 points.
Hardly through choice though, they must have been struggling to recruit and promoting from within is likely the only remaining option. The big names have left most probably because of frustration with culture or direction from the absolute most senior levels - from what I have read, Hector Ruiz made some terrible decisions and if you have a problem with a company's chairman, you'll be told "it's my way or the highway" and undoubtedly many people, including the widely-reported as incredibly talented Dirk Meyer, decided the door was the only option.
It's painfully clear they have haemorrhaged top talent, which indicates serious deep-rooted problems.