Another executive catch for Global Foundries

THE EXECUTIVE SHOPPING SPREE is still underway at AMD fab spinoff Global Foundries, with the firm announcing its latest hire, Curtis "Mojy" Chian, new senior veep of design enablement and Glofo's sixth external exec to sign up since the firm's launch in March.

Chian, who brings over twenty years experience with silicon process technologies to the party, was snapped up from programmable logic device company Altera, where he served as vice president of technology development and was the firm's technology ambassador to TSMC.

"Mojy brings the right combination of technical know-how and leadership experience," said CEO Doug Grose in praising his latest hire, who holds both a BsC and an MsC in electrical engineering as well as a masters in applied mathematics. Grose added that design enablement will be "one of the most critical functions to support the acquisition of new customers".

Global Foundries is looking to lure customers away from its Taiwanese rivals TSMC and UMC, and Chian, who will be based in Sunnyvale, California, will apparently be the "primary technical customer interface", or in layman's terms, the exec in charge of hooking 'em and reeling 'em in.

A company statement indicates that Chian will also be handed some plane tickets and told to go forth and build "a global partner ecosystem" made up of design IP and EDA providers to satisfy potential customers' every design infrastructure need.

Speaking of prospective customers, Altera - which is something of a leader in fabless chip design - is also potentially a Global Foundries customer, so Mojy could be the perfect angler to tempt the company's first big fish to bite.

"Global Foundries has created tremendous enthusiasm among potential customers by offering a strong alternative for advanced technologies," said Chian.

Chian added that he plans "to work closely with potential customers" in order to match Glofo's "technologies and capacity with their products and business requirements".

A big advantage for Global Foundries will be Chian's significant insight into the ways TSMC works with its customers, which will help the new fab company set itself apart and offer more attractive alternatives to cajole customers into deals, potentially causing big trouble for little China's chip mafia.

The INQ has also heard non-Chinese whispers that Glofo won't be stopping its hiring with Chian, and that more TSMC related new hires may be in the pipeline. µ