Intel CEO Robert "Bob" Holmes Swan will step down from his position at the tech giant company, and VMWare CEO Patrick "Pat" Gelsinger will replace him. Swan stepped up as Intel's boss in January 2019 after taking an interim basis a year following the shocking resignation of Intel's previous CEO, Brian Krzanich.
"Gelsinger is a highly respected CEO and industry veteran with more than four decades of technology and leadership experience, including 30 years at Intel, where he began his career," the company announces on its official website.
The decision is, however, unrelated to Intel's recent 2020 financial report. The company expects its fourth-quarter 2020 revenue number to exceed as it has made substantial progress on its 7nm process technology. Furthermore, Intel also plans on providing a full update, as scheduled on January 21, 2021.
After the news revealed on CNBC, Intel's stock price was up by 10% before the announcement, while VMWare's stock was down by more than 5%.
Familiar Faces
Bob Swan's long-lasting history with Intel has been documented well throughout the company's era. The Binghamton University alumni held various senior finance roles for 15 years at General Electric before joining Webvan in 1999 as a finance vice president.
However, Swan's venture at Intel did not start until 2016, when he replaced Stacy Smith as the new CFO (Chief Financial Officer) of Intel. During his time with the tech giant, Swan had oversight at that point for sales, manufacturing, and operations.
On the other hand, Gelsinger is no strange face for the company either. Unlike Swan, Gelsinger began his career at Intel as the company's first chief technology officer for over 30 years before jumping into others. Gelsinger was named the CEO of VMware in September 2012, and prior to that, he served as President and Chief Operating Officer at Dell EMC. He was the key man behind several Intel discoveries, such as USB and Wi-Fi technology, and the original 80486 processor architect in the Core and Xeon families.
Financial Criticism
Swan's extensive financial background and lack of technical acumen backfired on him, as CNBC reported, while Gelsinger has more technical experience.
His tenure at Intel was not an easy one, especially after competing against the likes of Apple and AMD. Last summer, Intel's latest-gen chip would be delayed while AMD's were already shipping inside laptops, and Apple broke its 15-year partnership with Intel over chip supplies for Mac devices.
"I believe Intel has significant potential to continue to reshape the future of technology and look forward to working with the incredibly talented global Intel team to accelerate innovation and create value for our customers and shareholders," said Gelsinger, as noted from Tom's Hardware.
In another news for Intel, the chip giant Swan did not even lead Intel's presentation at CES 2021 as he did in 2020. Instead, exec-VP Greg Bryan stepped up for the position as he revealed the company's blueprint to expand the 11th generation of its "Core" processor architecture.
