AMD Loses CTO, Rough Earnings Call Looms
AMD earlier in the week announced plans to downsize its workforce by approximately 10 percent by the end of the third quarter of this year. The spokesperson said Hester's departure was unrelated to the headcount reduction, which will result in a Q2 restructuring charge of an as-yet unknown amount.
Hester, who spent a good part of his career at IBM before arriving at AMD, put in his final day Friday, according to the spokesperson. The CTO position will not be filled, according to AMD, and Hester's duties will be taken on by executives in individual business units. When former head of sales and marketing Henri Richard left AMD last August, the responsibilities of that position were similarly absorbed by several executives in the company.
In addition to the downsizing plans, AMD this week announced that it anticipates a 15 percent sequential decrease in revenues for Q1 of this year "due to lower than expected sales across all business segments." While AMD expects revenues for the quarter ending March 29 to be $1.5 billion, a 22 percent increase over Q1 2007, the decline from Q4 exceeded what the company had anticipated from seasonality.
Going into its April 17 first-quarter earnings call, AMD certainly seems to have prepped investors for bad news in what looks like an effort to cushion itself from market blowback hitting all at once.