The chip maker Advanced Micro Devices on Monday pushed out its 49-year-old chief executive, Dirk Meyer, in a move that took industry analysts by surprise.
In its announcement, released after the markets closed, the company sought to reassure Wall Street by reporting in advance a few details of fourth-quarter results. It said revenue for the quarter would be about $1.65 billion, slightly head of the analysts’ estimates of $1.62 billion, as compiled by Thomson Reuters. A.M.D. said its guidance for 2011 results remained unchanged.
The company named its chief financial officer, Thomas Seifert, 47, as interim chief executive, and said the search for a new chief would begin immediately.
In a statement, Bruce Claflin, the A.M.D. chairman, did not address the timing of the surprise move or its reason, beyond generalities. He thanked Mr. Meyer, an engineer and former chip designer who became chief executive in July 2008, for guiding A.M.D. through a revamping of its product lines, a spinoff of its manufacturing plants and settling its long-running antitrust suit against its far-larger rival, Intel.
But with those tasks accomplished, Mr. Claflin said, A.M.D. now needed to improve its market position, growth and financial returns. “We believe a change in leadership,” Mr. Claflin said, “will accelerate the company’s ability to accomplish these objectives.”
Still, analysts were puzzled by the move and its timing.
“The snake isn’t moving fast enough, so you cut off its head?” said Stacy Rasgon, an analyst at Bernstein Research. “The timing is extremely odd, and it’s only going to fuel uncertainty in the stock.”
A.M.D. shares dropped more than 4 percent in after-hours trading, down 37 cents to $8.82 a share. In the regular session, shares had risen 36 cents to $9.19 a share.
In its statement, the company said that its product plans for graphics chips and new microprocessor designs remained on track.
A.M.D. has long had a roller-coaster trajectory, living in the shadow of Intel, the producer of the microprocessors used in most personal computers. At times, A.M.D. moved ahead of Intel in cutting-edge designs, while in other cases, it suffered heavy losses.
Today, A.M.D. holds about a 12 percent share of the personal computer microprocessor market, analysts say. In 2009, A.M.D. freed itself from debt and the cost of constantly investing in new factories, spinning them off into a separate company called GlobalFoundries.
The investment arm of the Persian Gulf emirate Abu Dhabi took the majority stake. A.M.D. still owns about 30 percent of GlobalFoundries.
A.M.D. holds a strong position in specialized graphics processing chips, with about a 50 percent share, as video performance becomes increasingly important in computing.
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