The Intel board of directors have accepted the resignation of CEO, Brian Krzanich, after an ongoing investigation into a consensual relationship with another Intel employee was recently uncovered. The board has named current chief financial office, Robert Swan, as interim CEO, and Intel stock has risen by 2.1% as a result.
The relationship between Krzanich and the unnamed Intel employee is in direct violation of Intel’s non-fraternization policy, and Intel has stated that it applies to all managers and that there is an “expectation that all employees will respect Intel’s values and adhere to the company’s code of conduct.”
Things haven’t been going great for Intel with AMD taking pole position in our list of the best CPUs for gaming…
Krzanich has been the Intel CEO since taking over from Paul Otellini in May 2013, and has presided over some of Intel’s best performance, but there had been some suspicion that Intel and Krzanich might part ways before this came out, with a resurgent AMD potentially set to wipe almost $4 billion per year from its server revenue.
“The Board believes strongly in Intel’s strategy,” said Intel Chairman, Andy Bryant, in the press release announcement, “and we are confident in Bob Swan’s ability to lead the company as we conduct a robust search for our next CEO. Bob has been instrumental to the development and execution of Intel’s strategy, and we know the company will continue to smoothly execute. We appreciate Brian’s many contributions to Intel.”
On the back of this announcement Intel’s share price has risen by 2.1% at the time or writing, potentially signifying that the city is quite happy with the situation. I’m sure Lisa Su and co. are probably watching on with interest too.
Intel has said that “the board has a robust succession planning process in place and has begun a search for a permanent CEO, including both internal and external candidates. The board will retain a leading executive search firm to assist in the process.”
Might we see another ex-AMD bod jumping ship to helm rivals Intel?