AMD Lays Off 10% of Global Workforce

[Rob Williams]

AMD yesterday announced its biggest "optimization" ever, and unfortunately, it has nothing to do with a CPU or GPU. One of the first major decisions made by new CEO Rory Read was to lay-off 10% of AMD's global workforce, a move that's designed to save the company $200 million and allow a more efficient re-focus through 2012.

Read the rest of our post and then discuss it here!

 

[Doomsday]

Unlucky blokes! Lay offs always suck!

 

[OriginalJoeCool]

"Optimization" haha. They sure love playing with people's lives.

 

[MacMan]

This is sad news and not just for those laid off, but for the general tech community as a whole. Having to depend on just one major player really sucks! I hope that AMD can turn things around and soon, both for its workers, those laid off and those who are now probably wondering if they'll be able to keep theirs, and, of course, the general public at large who could use an alternative source of chip power goodness.

 

[Kougar]

At first, I assumed it was from the CPU division, but it is not. There are a ton of high level ATI folks getting kicked to the curb here.

Carrell Killebrew is Director of Product Planning for AMD's GPU division. He's the guy to thank for ATI's recovery after the ATI 2900XT fiasco, as he changed the company's focus from single, giant monolithic cores to smaller, highly focused and efficient designs seen in the 5870 and 6800/6970 cards. Apparently he and a bunch of other guys are being shown the door, without any warning at all.

Anand clued me into this, but he's right. You don't fire your best guys in the pursuit of cost-cutting. I am seriously hoping AMD just didn't cut off it's last good leg to stand on.