Intel’s Diane Bryant Retires, Joins Google Cloud as COO
by Anton Shilov on December 4, 2017 12:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Servers
- Intel
- Google Cloud
After 32 years with Intel, Diane Bryant, who served as the head of Intel's Data Center Group from 2012 to mid-2017, decided to retire from the company. Ms. Bryant was subsequently announced as joining Google Cloud as COO. Navin Shenoy will continue to lead Intel’s DCG.
Diane Bryant took a leave of absence from Intel to focus on personal family matters in early May. Initially, she planned to step away for the following six to eight months and then return to a new position at the chip giant. Six months were to end on December 3, but instead of returning to Intel, Ms. Bryant decided to retire from the chip company effective December 1 and join Google Cloud, where she will serve as COO. Her exact responsibilities are not completely clear at the moment, but given her position, it is logical to assume that she will be responsible for day to day Google Cloud’s business operations as well as its evolution (from a tactical point of view) going forward.
Diane Bryant joined Intel in 1985 and worked at different positions throughout her career. Most recently she served as the head of Intel’s DCG, where she headed its transformation from a group focused on the development of server platforms to a business unit that develops various solutions for data centers, including servers, networking, and storage equipment.
In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Intel said that it would sign an agreement with Ms. Bryant that would put “certain restrictions on the use of confidential information and on solicitation of Intel employees”. The filing also mentions that Ms. Bryant will receive Intel's retirement benefits and receive a separation payment of $4.5 million. The official statement from Intel on the news is as follows:
"We are extremely grateful for Diane’s contributions to Intel over the last 32 years, and wish her well with her new opportunity."
As for Intel, the company is confident of Navin Shenoy and is satisfied with his management of DCG. Before taking over DCG, he was responsible for Intel’s Client Computing Group and before that he held different positions at the company, including sales and marketing.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
18 Comments
View All Comments
Sttm - Monday, December 4, 2017 - link
If it was as an adviser or board member, yeah I could see that being retirement. But COO... that is a real job, real demanding... She is not going to get to relax for awhile.yannigr2 - Monday, December 4, 2017 - link
I wonder if Nvidia's success on the data center market has anything to do with this "retirement". On Google things will be probably less stressful.HStewart - Monday, December 4, 2017 - link
NVidia most likely had nothing to do this, she probably initially wanted to retried but Google gave her offer that she could not refused. It very possible that her retirement actually trigger Google to step in. Especially with 30 years of benefits from Intel, she was good position to negotiate terms.iwod - Tuesday, December 5, 2017 - link
Likely so. Google has been paying 10s of millions to Deep Learning and Ai expert at Nvidia. The money for a top COO must be very large sum as well.Yojimbo - Tuesday, December 5, 2017 - link
Google Cloud and Google's AI efforts are two different things.Yojimbo - Tuesday, December 5, 2017 - link
I think it's possible. Intel's long term data center acceleration plan is a bit of a mess, and acceleration is becoming more and more important. I wouldn't be surprised if the decision to pursue a high performance GPU and Diane Bryant's departure are related in some way. In particular, Intel seems to have been caught completely off guard by the deep learning revolution. A small but significant piece of evidence of that is the cancellation of the Aurora supercomputer, which goes along with the sudden and abrupt rejiggering of the Xeon Phi road map.peevee - Monday, December 4, 2017 - link
"separation payment of $4.5 million"Why would not you retire if you have an incentive like that?
Ananke - Monday, December 4, 2017 - link
She is eligible for the company's retirement package, which many private businesses don't offer anymore. And, she also gets the separation package, which is usually for an exchange of not sharing confidential knowledge and not soliciting. She "retired" from Intel, not that she stopped working. Probably, they didn't offered her a position as CEO of Intel , hence she was looking for opportunities elsewhere.