By Graham K. Rogers

Earlier in the day, the CEO of AMD, a major chip maker, was replaced by the company's COO, Lisa Su. In a rare, but positive move for tech companies, Su - a woman and Asian - was obviously promoted on merit.

Market Watch analyst (Therese Poletti reports that the move comes just ahead of the 3rd quarter results that were to be reported next week and this is making some uneasy, although the appointment of Su is seen as positive.

With sales of some chips falling, and fierce competition from others in the sector, expected improvements in the company balance sheet were not as good as some were hoping and rather than the 5 years that had been expected, Rory Read is gone in 3.

While Su who has a PhD and is a fellow of IEEE, had come from within the industry (Freescale Semiconductor), Read had arrived at AMD from Lenovo.

See also:

Graham K. Rogers teaches at the Faculty of Engineering, Mahidol University in Thailand where he is also Assistant Dean. He wrote in the Bangkok Post, Database supplement on IT subjects. For the last seven years of Database he wrote a column on Apple and Macs. He is now continuing that in the Bangkok Post supplement, Life.