The Greatest Turnaround in Silicon Valley History?

About a year ago, a nearly $2 billion Silicon Valley takeover slipped under the radar. It wasn't all that surprising. For one thing, the startup that got acquired, Pensando Systems, was hardly a household name. For another, the buyout came just three months after the acquirer completed another acquisition – this one with a $49 […] You're receiving this email as part of your subscription to Michael Robinson’s Trend Trader Daily [Unsubscribe](. [Trend Trader Daily] The Greatest Turnaround in Silicon Valley History? April 07, 2023 About a year ago, a nearly $2 billion Silicon Valley takeover slipped under the radar. It wasn't all that surprising. For one thing, the startup that got acquired, Pensando Systems, was hardly a household name. For another, the buyout came just three months after the acquirer completed another acquisition – this one with a $49 billion price tag. The thing is, these two deals demonstrate just how successful Lisa Su has become. Don't know who she is? Don't worry – she's not really a household name, either. And when she got the top job at one of the world's major chip leaders, Wall Street didn't pay much attention. In fact, in the months after she took the reins, the company's stock treaded water... But as they say, that was then... and this is now. Under Su's watch, her company has grown more than 25x in what ranks as one of the great Silicon Valley turnarounds in history. And don't worry if you haven't invested in her company just yet. There's still time, because I'm convinced there's plenty of upside ahead. > ADVERTISEMENT < The Fed’s Boldest Move Ever... A national currency "reset" is coming to America. With every dollar soon under Fed control, how will FedNow impact your day-to-day expenses?... your paycheck?... your social security?... your investments? [Don’t wait to find out](. An Expert in Semiconductors Born in Taiwan, Su moved to America when she was just three years old. She attended MIT for college, where she chose Electrical Engineering because she thought it would be the most difficult major to pursue. After earning her Bachelor's, Su continued on, earning a Master's degree and Doctorate in Electrical Engineering, too. What followed was a career that spanned storied, big-name tech firms – places like Texas Instruments (TXN), the inventor of the silicon transistor and processors, and IBM (IBM), the pioneer in both mainframes and personal computers. To say she knows the semiconductor industry, both through academic theory and in practice, would be an understatement. Against All Odds Indeed, as Chief Executive Officer ("CEO") of Advanced Micro Devices (Nasdaq: AMD), Su has done a great job, one that has truly benefited shareholders. Su joined AMD in 2012, serving as Senior Vice President for Global Business and Chief Operating Officer. When she became CEO in October 2014, the company was among the walking wounded. There were even rumors of bankruptcy. Even though AMD went public back in 1972 and was well known on a global stage, shares were in the cellar, trading at around $3. The announcement that Su was taking over didn't change that, either. Despite her accomplishments, Wall Street wasn't impressed with her – at least, not initially. In fact, shares headed down following the announcement. But despite all that, Su initiated one of the great technology turnarounds of all time. A Pair of Deals Lead the Way Look no further than the fact that AMD has spent tens of billions recently to acquire tech companies Pensando and Xilinx. The $49 billion Xilinx acquisition was a huge push into the growing data center market. As more services move into the "cloud," demand for specialized data center equipment to power the cloud is growing rapidly. Xilinx is a designer of programmable chips that can accelerate key data center tasks much better, while using less power than traditional processors. We're talking things like Artificial Intelligence ("AI") applications and encoding/decoding operations for video streaming services. As for Pensando, which AMD purchased last May for $2 billion, the startup's distributed computing systems further expanded AMD's data center offerings. The move helped clients to increase data transfer speeds, security, and analytics in their data centers. Hardly a One-Trick Pony Su's push into the data center market has paid off handsomely. Take Facebook owner Meta Platforms (META), for example. Since its founding, Meta had used Intel (INTC) chips to power its cloud data centers. But the latest in AMD's line of processors, which increase performance in data center workloads by up to 50%, convinced Meta that a change was needed. In November 2021, Meta announced it was moving its data centers over to AMD chips. With that announcement, all four global cloud giants were officially AMD customers: Meta, Amazon (AMZN), Microsoft (MSFT), and Alphabet (GOOGL). To be clear, Su hasn't focused exclusively on the data center market. Under her leadership, AMD has also started catching up to rival Intel in the consumer PC market. After years of undisputed leadership, Intel grew complacent with its dominance there, and let its research and development into consumer processors falter. Su had AMD sweep in a few years ago and deliver more power-efficient PC processors that run faster, cost less money, and need less cooling than Intel's offerings. Furthermore, AMD is the sole provider of both processor and graphics chips for the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and Xbox Series S gaming consoles. Simply put, Su has deftly positioned AMD to profit regardless of whether gamers choose to play on PCs, PlayStations, or Xbox consoles. An Earnings Powerhouse With so many irons in the fire, it should come as no surprise that, under Su, AMD has become an earnings powerhouse. Sure, per-share profits were off in last year's fourth quarter as the entire sector got hit by the chip shortage. But over the past three years, AMD has averaged earnings per-share growth of 92%. We'll have a better sense of how Su is executing her plan when the company reports on May 2. In the meantime, we can capitalize on her outstanding leadership by investing in AMD now. And if you're looking to maximize your profit potential – we're talking possible gains of nearly 200% – check out my "Pro" recommendation.   FOR TREND TRADER PRO READERS ONLY > [LEARN MORE]( < Cheers and Good Investing, [Michael Robinson] Michael Robinson Chief Investment Officer Trend Trader Daily   Copyright © Trend Trader Daily, All rights reserved. You signed up on []( Our mailing address is: Trend Trader Daily 1125 N. Charles Street Baltimore, Maryland 21201 [Update Subscription Preferences]( |Unsubscribe from this list RISK NOTICE: All investing comes with risk. 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