illustration of a retro semiconductor with text "INTEL"

Intel’s Gelsinger Gets Forced Out

Intel’s CEO Gelsinger has been forced out! Officially Gelsinger “retired” but the rumor is the board of directors ditched him. Which is unsurprising. Gelsinger had not made much progress on fixing Intel and ultimately wasn’t going to deliver on his vision. He couldn’t deliver because of Intel’s financial state, which he is ultimately responsible for.

Intel ousted CEO Pat Gelsinger over the weekend, capping a tumultuous nearly four-year tenure at what was America’s leading semiconductor company before its stock price and market share collapsed.

The company announced Gelsinger’s resignation Monday morning, which a person familiar with the matter said came after a contentious board meeting last week over Gelsinger’s perceived failure to respond to Nvidia’s competitive edge and a lack of confidence in Gelsinger’s turnaround plans.

Intel CFO David Zinsner and Intel products CEO MJ Holthaus were named interim co-CEOs. Longtime board member Frank Yeary will serve as interim executive chair. Shares of Intel were down 2% Monday afternoon.

https://www.cnbc.com/2024/12/02/intel-ceo-pat-gelsinger-is-out.html

image of vacuum tubes and components

Gelsinger had vision, but he did not execute on that vision properly. I believe he couldn’t execute partly because of business conditions at Intel and the fact that Intel’s management is politicized and mainly focused on maintaining their pathetic little fiefdoms inside the company. The bigger the fief the bigger the dick after all.

If Intel were smart it would poach a new CEO from a company like Nvidia. Somebody who is familiar with the semiconductor industry but is not tainted by Intel’s culture. But I’m guessing they won’t do that.

And not only will they not grab a competent CEO I’m also betting they will use the fact that the CEOs are interim to implement even more layoffs and capital expenditure cuts. Kind of like ripping the Band-Aid off. Except this is like the fifth Band-Aid.

I’m guessing the stock price is not going to be happy in the short term.

Anyway, let’s hope our too big to fail semiconductor monster gets it’s shit together and wakes up.

It goes without saying, I am not giving you financial advice and if you need financial advice you should see an advisor.