Phil Hester, AMD's new Chief Technology Officer, is best known for running IBM's Personal Computing Division. But in my mind, equally relevant is his leadership in IBM's effort to derive a mass-market CPU from IBM's RS/6000 RISC system designs (which evolved into the POWER family of enterprise CPUs). The resulting derivative CPU architecture, PowerPC, is now a broadly licensed property and a first choice in embe Phil Hester, AMD’s new Chief Technology Officer, is best known for running IBM’s Personal Computing Division. But in my mind, equally relevant is his leadership in IBM’s effort to derive a mass-market CPU from IBM’s RS/6000 RISC system designs (which evolved into the POWER family of enterprise CPUs). The resulting derivative CPU architecture, PowerPC, is now a broadly licensed property and a first choice in embedded, automotive, aerospace, system management and application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs).It should not escape your notice that Phil Hester brings to AMD insider experience with two of its chief competitors. IBM was at the top of Intel’s OEM food chain, and Hester was one of the key players in managing that relationship. AMD is stepping up its presence in high-end embedded systems, and that’s a segment in which PowerPC is particularly successful. That’s not why AMD hired Hester, but he came through the door having earned his first years’ salary if only in competitor intimidation. This man knows too much.Hester is a newcomer to AMD’s payroll, but not to AMD. After getting an early peek at AMD’s Hammer project, Phil Hester co-founded Newisys, a start-up that produced extraordinarily well-designed, enterprise-grade Opteron rack servers for OEMs (original equipment manufacturers). My Newisys-made server is one of two machines–my Xserve G5 is the other–that I open periodically just to ogle their exquisite engineering. Admittedly, I’m putting a lot on the shoulders of a man I know only by story and reputation. I’m hoping that my insight is accurate and that Phil Hester is someone to whom AMD’s executives should defer on matters within his incredibly broad experience, and that reaches beyond AMD64 and AMD’s unseen next-generation CPU, K9.You see, AMD has a great story in commercial CPUs, but as a whole it is far from hitting on all cylinders. The company is neither broke nor broken, but the tally of AMD’s unexploited assets and opportunities is substantial. Hester’s credentials qualify him as something of a turnaround specialist, and AMD needs some turning around, or at least some turning. Unless I miss my guess, Phil Hester’s precisely the right guy for AMD’s CTO post. And I don’t usually miss my guesses. In any case, I extend my best wishes to AMD’s outgoing CTO, Fred Weber, and to Phil Hester. Technology Industry