AMD’s Chief Technology Officer steps down

Hester came to AMD from IBM in September of 2005, when the chipmaker was flying high on the success of its Opteron server processor. He’s leaving at a low point for AMD, having presided over the debacle that was AMD’s quad-core server processor, Barcelona. Barcelona finally became available in mass quantities this week after a year of delays caused by technical glitches and design issues.

Rob Keosheyan, an AMD spokesman, said Hester’s involvement with Barcelona was not “hands on,” although his biography on AMD’s site said Hester was “responsible for setting the architectural and product strategies and plans for AMD’s microprocessor business.” Keosheyan said that was an “outdated” description of what Hester’s day-to-day responsibilities were at the company.