AMD vs SK Hynix: Founders, CEOs and History
AMD was founded in 1969 by Jerry Sanders, Edwin Turney and is led by Lisa Su. SK Hynix was founded in 1983 by Chung Ju-yung and is led by Kwak Noh-jung.
Company facts
Founders
AMD
Jerry Sanders
Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) was founded in May 1969 by Jerry Sanders, a charismatic, flamboyant electrical engineer, along with seven of his colleagues from Fairchild Semiconductor (the well-known incubator of Silicon Valley that also birthed Intel).
Edwin Turney
Edwin Turney helped establish the operating foundation behind AMD's early logic-device business. While Sanders became the public face, Turney's contribution was making sure the company could earn trust through production reliability and execution.
SK Hynix
Chung Ju-yung
Chung Ju-yung (1915-2001) founded Hyundai Electronics in 1983 as part of his massive industrial conglomerate. He pushed the company aggressively into the highly capital-intensive semiconductor business.
CEOs and their tenures
AMD
- Jerry Sanders1969–2002
CEO
Sanders, born in Chicago in 1936, worked at Douglas Aircraft and Motorola before joining Fairchild Semiconductor in 1961, where he rose to head worldwide sales and marketing.
Source - Hector Ruiz2002–2008
CEO
Ruiz grew up in Piedras Negras, Mexico, and as a teenager crossed the US border daily to attend high school in Eagle Pass, Texas, graduating valedictorian only three years after learning English.
Source - Dirk Meyer2008–2011
CEO
Meyer, a University of Illinois computer-engineering graduate with an MBA from Boston University, co-architected the Alpha 21064 and 21264 microprocessors at Digital Equipment Corporation before joining AMD in 1996, where he personally led development of the o…
Source - Rory Read2011–2014
CEO
Read spent 23 years at IBM in global leadership roles before becoming president and COO of Lenovo, and holds an information-sciences degree from Hartwick College.
Source - Lisa Su2014–present
CEO
Born in Taiwan and raised in the United States, Su earned bachelor's, master's and doctorate degrees in electrical engineering from MIT and worked at Texas Instruments, IBM and Freescale Semiconductor before joining AMD in 2012 as senior vice president of glob…
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SK Hynix
- Chey Tae-won2012–present
Chairman, SK Group
His aggressive capital injection transformed the struggling chipmaker into SK Hynix, securing the resources needed to eventually dominate the global High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) market.
Source - Lee Seok-hee2018–2022
Former Chief Executive Officer
As CEO, he navigated brutal US-China semiconductor trade restrictions while maintaining massive capital expenditures in next-generation DRAM facilities.
Source - Kwak Noh-jung2022–present
President and Chief Executive Officer
Kwak joined Hyundai Electronics in 1994 and became CEO in March 2022. He led the company through the 2023 downturn, the HBM3E and HBM4 ramps, FY2025 revenue of ~$69B (KRW 97.15T), and the July 2026 Nasdaq ADR listing.
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Timeline: AMD and SK Hynix side by side
1969AMD
Advanced Micro Devices Founded
Jerry Sanders and seven colleagues from Fairchild Semiconductor founded AMD on May 1, 1969, and broke ground that year on the 915 DeGuigne building in Sunnyvale, California, which remained the headquarters for more than 47 years.
1975AMD
Entry Into Microprocessors
AMD entered the microprocessor market in 1975, moving beyond the logic devices it started with. The decision put it into direct competition with Intel and made x86 compatibility the center of its business for the next four decades.
1983SK Hynix
Hyundai Electronics Founded
Hyundai Group establishes Hyundai Electronics in Icheon, South Korea, entering the semiconductor memory market with DRAM manufacturing capabilities.
1992SK Hynix
First 64Mb DRAM Chip
Hyundai Electronics becomes one of the first companies globally to develop a 64Mb DRAM chip, establishing its position as a high-quality memory manufacturer.
1999AMD
Athlon Breakthrough
Athlon launched in 1999 and matched or beat Intel on desktop performance. In March 2000 AMD announced the first 1 GHz x86 processor, days ahead of Intel, which changed how enthusiasts and PC makers judged the company.
1999SK Hynix
Merger With LG Semicon
Hyundai Electronics merged with LG Semicon in 1999.
2001SK Hynix
Renamed Hynix Semiconductor
Following Hyundai Group's financial restructuring, the semiconductor unit is renamed Hynix Semiconductor and undergoes creditor-led turnaround.
2005AMD
Antitrust Lawsuit Against Intel
AMD sued Intel in 2005, alleging rebates and exclusionary practices that limited its access to PC makers.
2006AMD
ATI Technologies Acquired
AMD acquired ATI Technologies in 2006 for about $5.4B to add graphics and chipsets. The debt-funded deal strained the balance sheet just as Intel shipped Core 2, but ATI became the basis for Radeon graphics, console APUs, and later Instinct accelerators.
2009AMD
Fabless Pivot Through GlobalFoundries
AMD moved its manufacturing operations into GlobalFoundries in 2009 and stopped owning fabs. The change removed billions of annual capital spending and let AMD buy leading-edge capacity, but it also tied the product roadmap to outside foundries.
2011AMD
Bulldozer Architecture Failure
Bulldozer traded single-thread performance for core count at a time when most software depended on per-core speed. Reviews were poor, PC maker confidence fell, and server share collapsed, which is what forced the clean-sheet Zen project.
2012SK Hynix
SK Group Acquisition
SK Group acquires a controlling stake in Hynix Semiconductor for approximately $3.4 billion, renaming it SK Hynix Inc. and integrating it into the SK conglomerate.
2014AMD
Lisa Su Becomes CEO
AMD's board appointed Lisa Su president and CEO on October 8, 2014, succeeding Rory Read. She narrowed the company around high-performance computing and put the engineering budget behind the Zen CPU core rather than spreading it across incremental projects.
2017AMD
Ryzen, EPYC, and Chiplets Rebuild AMD
Zen reached the market in 2017 as Ryzen for desktops and EPYC for servers. Chiplet packaging over Infinity Fabric let AMD build high core-count parts from smaller dies, improving usable yield and giving it a cost structure Intel's monolithic designs could not…
2018SK Hynix
Stake in Toshiba Memory
SK Hynix joined the Bain Capital consortium that bought Toshiba Memory, now Kioxia, in 2018.
2020SK Hynix
Intel NAND Business Acquisition
SK Hynix announces acquisition of Intel's NAND flash memory and SSD business for $9 billion, significantly expanding its NAND market share.
2022AMD
Xilinx Acquisition
AMD completed the Xilinx acquisition in February 2022. The all-stock deal was announced in October 2020 at about $35B and was worth roughly $49B at close.
2022SK Hynix
Kwak Noh-jung becomes CEO
Kwak Noh-jung became CEO of SK Hynix in 2022. Kwak joined Hyundai Electronics in 1994 and became CEO in March 2022.
2023SK Hynix
HBM3 Mass Production for NVIDIA
SK Hynix becomes the first company to mass-produce HBM3 high-bandwidth memory, securing NVIDIA as a primary customer for AI accelerator applications.
2024SK Hynix
FY2024 Memory-Cycle Recovery
SK hynix reported ~$47B (KRW 66.19T) of FY2024 revenue as HBM demand and DRAM price recovery returned it to a ~$14.1B (KRW 19.79T) net profit after the 2023 loss.
2025AMD
ZT Systems Acquired and Its Factories Sold
AMD closed the ZT Systems purchase on March 31, 2025, paying $3.2B in cash plus 8.3 million shares for rack-scale AI systems design.
2025AMD
OpenAI Agrees to Deploy 6 Gigawatts of AMD GPUs
On October 6, 2025 AMD and OpenAI announced a multi-year agreement covering 6 gigawatts of AMD GPUs, starting with a 1 gigawatt Instinct MI450 deployment in the second half of 2026.
2025AMD
Record $34.6B Revenue
AMD reported FY2025 revenue of $34.6B, up 34%, with net income of $4.3B and a 50% gross margin.
2026AMD
Meta Agrees to Deploy Up to 6 Gigawatts of AMD GPUs
On February 24, 2026 AMD and Meta announced a multi-year agreement for up to 6 gigawatts of Instinct GPUs.
2026SK Hynix
SK hynix posts record FY2025 and Q1 2026 AI-memory results
SK hynix reported FY2025 revenue of ~$69B (KRW 97.1467T) and followed with Q1 2026 revenue of ~$37.3B (KRW 52.5763T) as AI memory demand accelerated.
2026SK Hynix
Nasdaq ADR listing and record Q2
SK hynix listed ADRs on Nasdaq on July 10, 2026, then reported record Q2 revenue of ~$56.3B (KRW 79.32T) and a 76% operating margin.
Acquisitions
AMD
- ZT Systems2025$4.9B
- Silo AI2024$665M
- Xilinx2022$49B
- Pensando Systems2022$1.9B
- ATI Technologies2006$5.4B
SK Hynix
- Key Foundry2022Undisclosed
- Intel NAND and Solidigm2020$9B
- LG Semiconductor1999Undisclosed
Questions about AMD vs SK Hynix
Who is the CEO of Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. and SK Hynix Inc.?
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. is led by Lisa Su and SK Hynix Inc. is led by Kwak Noh-jung. Both serve as the top executive responsible for the company's strategy, operations, and financial performance.
When was Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. founded vs SK Hynix Inc.?
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. was founded in 1969 — 14 years before SK Hynix Inc., which was founded in 1983. Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.'s longer operating history gives it a deeper track record but also potentially more institutional inertia compared to the younger SK Hynix Inc..
How many employees does Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. have compared to SK Hynix Inc.?
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. employs approximately 31,000 people, while SK Hynix Inc. employs approximately 46,863. SK Hynix Inc. has the larger workforce at 46,863 employees, compared to Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.'s 31,000. A higher headcount does not necessarily imply greater efficiency — it often reflects differences in business model (e.g., manufacturing vs. software).
Where are Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. and SK Hynix Inc. headquartered?
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. is headquartered in United States and SK Hynix Inc. is headquartered in South Korea. Their different home markets mean they may face different regulatory frameworks, tax regimes, and currency exposure.
Who founded Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. and SK Hynix Inc.?
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. was founded by Jerry Sanders, Edwin Turney. SK Hynix Inc. was founded by Chung Ju-yung.
Which company has a longer operating history — Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. or SK Hynix Inc.?
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. has been operating for approximately 57 years, making it the more established of the two companies. SK Hynix Inc. has been in operation for around 43 years. A longer operating history often signals greater institutional resilience and brand recognition, though it can also mean slower adaptation to new market conditions.
Figures come from each company's filings and the sources linked beside them. Amounts reported in another currency are shown in US dollars at an approximate rate and marked with ~. Back to the AMD vs SK Hynix overview