Tuesday, April 9th 2019

Intel Soaks Up Heather Lennon, AMD RTG Digital Marketing Head

Intel has hired another of AMD's top executives as Raja Koduri hopes to basically rebuild RTG under Intel's banner and its resources. This time it's Heather Lennon, who led AMD Radeon Technologies Group (RTG) marketing and had been with AMD for over 10 years. She directed the Team Red community and won PR Week award for Campaign of the Year 2014. Lennon bagged 40 awards for digital marketing for AMD, and is widely believed to be the brains behind the PR upper-hand AMD enjoys among tech forums and the DIY community.

Lennon now joins Intel as Senior Manager, Digital Marketing for Graphics, and will work closely with Mark Taylor, an ex-NVIDIA exec who now leads technical marketing at Intel Graphics. Other ex-AMD and ex-NVIDIA honchos include Chris Hook and Tom Peterson, respectively. Raja Koduri is overseeing Intel's ambitious project to make inroads to the discrete GPU market under the new Xe brand, not just to serve gamers and PC enthusiasts, but more importantly GPU compute, cloud compute, and AI markets. Koduri is also reportedly lending insights to Intel's new Gen11 integrated graphics architecture, which debuts with its 10 nm "Ice Lake" processors.
Source: Heather Lennon (Twitter)
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38 Comments on Intel Soaks Up Heather Lennon, AMD RTG Digital Marketing Head

#26
LemmingOverlord
I think the best April Fools' prank would've been "Robert Swan steps down, Intel hires Lisa Su"
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#27
Caring1
What an unusual title, it sounds like she is wet, and Intel is a big sponge "soaking her up"
Posted on Reply
#28
juiseman
lol...yea. "Acquired through absorption" is an odd way to put a job transfer

I guess "soaking" would be the wrong term used. Maybe just

"Intel hires Heather Lennon, AMD RTG Digital Marketing Head"

would be ok.
Posted on Reply
#29
eidairaman1
The Exiled Airman
Making way for New Ideas at RTG.
Posted on Reply
#30
Totally
FxI believe that this and more money are the two primary reasons of the exodus. Most people will always do what is best for their career. Also, they all know that this isn't a permanent move; they can always come back to AMD 8 years later because it's nothing personal.
How would they just come waltzing back? I doubt AMD/NVIDIA's gonna keep a seat reserved for them at the table. They're going to get replaced and that replacement isn't going to get canned just because someone wants their old job back. The only person I've known to freely company hop is Jim Keller, as he is very good at what he does, has track record and transitions on the tail of success.
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#31
ODOGG26
How about good riddance.. I don't even see this as a bad thing. Everyone always talked about how bad AMD marketing is. Maybe she wasn't that great anyways. I see it as intel picking up scraps. Like some other posters said, It's good for some new blood, promotions within. AMD's marketing hasn't been great so I for one would like to see some fresh new and innovative people that will put life into their marketing.
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#32
tajoh111
This is actually a big loss for them, as big as Nvidia losing Tom Pederson.

If she was behind the Team Red community and it's viral marketing campaign, no wonder she won so many awards. The team red initiative along with viral marketing machine that fans the flames of team red is the good guy, nvidia is the bad guy is a very effective, particularly in terms of cost that has lead to many people being pro AMD and Anti Nvidia.

It has allowed AMD to get away with behavior like Nvidia with generally none of the backlash in terms of pricing and late product delivery. While we might criticize AMD marketing department, their team red and viral marketing campaign is nothing short of genius.

Remember AMD marketing budget for graphics is limited. The free marketing/cheap marketing due to team red has been very effective at raising AMD profile among forums.
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#33
oxidized
FreedomEclipseThink of Intel as Epic - they are giving these people suitcases full of money to be an Epic exclusive
With the difference Epic is offering NOTHING better or interesting, they're only bribing with money to convince them to swap sides. Working at a project like this at Intel, sounds honestly much more interesting than anything AMD or nvidia can offer at this time.
Posted on Reply
#34
Fx
TotallyHow would they just come waltzing back? I doubt AMD/NVIDIA's gonna keep a seat reserved for them at the table. They're going to get replaced and that replacement isn't going to get canned just because someone wants their old job back. The only person I've known to freely company hop is Jim Keller, as he is very good at what he does, has track record and transitions on the tail of success.
It isn't a matter of Heather deciding she wants to go back to AMD and them opening a positition. It isn't a matter of AMD reserving the spot for Heather.

What happens all the time is a positition becomes available (whatever X amount of years later) and then someone from AMD reaches out to Heather or she simply sees the positition and applies. As long as she performed well, she has a good chance of being reacquired.

Leaving a company isn't a personal matter for most companies (especially large corporations). It is just business.
Posted on Reply
#35
mtcn77
FxIt isn't a matter of Heather deciding she wants to go back to AMD and them opening a positition. It isn't a matter of AMD reserving the spot for Heather.

What happens all the time is a positition becomes available (whatever X amount of years later) and then someone from AMD reaches out to Heather or she simply sees the positition and applies. As long as she performed well, she has a good chance of being reacquired.

Leaving a company isn't a personal matter for most companies (especially large corporations). It is just business.
That's why sociopaths take comfort in the idea of an antisocial company environment.
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#36
remixedcat
So much poaching going on I need bacon...
Posted on Reply
#37
kapone32
I did not know this person worked at AMD before I read this thread. In my opinion they should have been fired as AMD is reticent to do marketing in traditional markets. Every day I hear or see Dell commercials with Intel I7 but we are talking about GPUs and Nvidia is at every Super Bowl. I have yet to see a commercial for AMD on any platform.
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#38
ThrashZone
Hi,
That's what Intel and Raja need, is newer better marketing heads :laugh:
Posted on Reply
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