Former AMD chief Ruiz leaving spin-off
Hector Ruiz, chairman of Advanced Micro Devices spin-off Globalfoundries, will resign from the company in January. The announcement follows the emergence of his name in connection to the Galleon Funds insider trading case.
Ruiz "will take a voluntary leave of absence effective immediately before resigning from the company in January," according to a statement Monday from the Globalfoundries board. Ruiz had submitted his resignation to the board in September with an effective date of January 4, 2010, the statement said.
Hector Ruiz
(Credit: AMD)The resignation comes after an unnamed executive at AMD--which turned out to be Ruiz, according to a report--was cited repeatedly in a complaint filed last month by the U.S. attorney for New York's Southern District.
The case revolves around Raj Rajaratnam, who founded the Galleon Group, a New York-based hedge fund that manages $7 billion. Federal prosecutors have charged Rajaratnam and five others with securities fraud, alleging they were involved in insider trading of well-known tech companies, including Intel, Google, AMD, and IBM.
All have said they are innocent, according to The Wall Street Journal.
The U.S. Attorney's complaint alleges Rajaratnam and others engaged in insider-trading activity when AMD was trying to reorganize and spin off its manufacturing operations--which eventually became Globalfoundries, which is a joint venture with the Abu Dhabi government.
Ruiz, who is also former CEO and chairman of AMD, has not been charged with a crime, according to The New York Times.
He will be replaced at Globalfoundries by Alan E. "Lanny" Ross, who will serve as interim chairman, effective immediately, until a permanent chairman has been appointed by the board, according to Globalfoundries. Ross, a current member of the Globalfoundries board, was previously president and CEO of communications chip supplier Broadcom.
Ruiz joined AMD in January 2000 as president and chief operating officer, and was named chief executive officer in April 2002. He was appointed chairman of the board in April 2004, and was named executive chairman in June 2008.
Ruiz was appointed chairman of Globalfoundries when it was formed in October of last year.
He spent 22 years at Motorola, and in his last post there, served as president of the firm's Semiconductor Products Sector. Ruiz also worked at Texas Instruments in the company's research laboratories and manufacturing operations.
Brooke Crothers has served as an editor at large at CNET News, an editor at Dow Jones' Asian Wall Street Journal Weekly, and a senior editor at InfoWorld. His CNET blog covers chip technology and computer systems, and how they define the computing experience. He also contributes to The New York Times' Bits and Technology sections. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. Follow Brooke on Twitter @mbrookec. 
