Drew Prairie, a company spokesman, said the cuts would be spread across a variety of departments and regions.

A.M.D., based in Sunnyvale, Calif., is in the process of splitting into two businesses. It plans to have the majority of workers stay on at A.M.D. to handle processor designs, while roughly 3,000 employees will head to a new manufacturing operation jointly owned by A.M.D. and investors backed by the Abu Dhabi government.

The new entity – tentatively called the Foundry Company – will be based somewhere in Silicon Valley and should begin operations early next year.

One company which listened, to its detriment, to shareholders was Microsoft. When Bill Gates ran the software company, he liked to keep a year's worth of expenses on hand, in case things went awry. Microsoft is no longer quite so stingy with its cash; it dribbles some out in dividends, and gave shareholders a $32 billion payout a few years back. Good thing it didn't shell out $44 billion for Yahoo; that deal would have left it cash-poor and debt-ridden, at exactly the wrong time. Even so, Microsoft's balance sheet is no longer the most sterling in tech.

So who's got cash on hand? Here are the 10 richest tech companies, from a Yahoo Finance screening. (I left out companies, like IBM, whose cash was matched by equally outsized debts.)

1. China Mobile, $31.0 billion
   China's oil, steel, and finance giants are investing overseas. Why not its leading wireless company? Yes, China censors its citizens. That was a trendy thing to worry about in August 2008.
2. Cisco Systems, $26.2 billion
   Cisco's so proud of its cash pile, its investor-relations chief has blogged about it. If only investors had any confidence in Cisco's bizarre social-network acquisition strategy, which has nothing to do with its fine telecom-equipment assets. Memo to Cisco's M&A team: Just because it has the word "network" in it doesn't mean you have to buy it.
3. Microsoft, $21.2 billion
   The $44 billion Yahoo offer was half in cash, half in stock, which would have strained Microsoft's finances and required it to take on some debt. Good thing it fell through.
4. Apple, $20.7 billion
   In the '90s, Apple almost ran out of money. No danger of that happening soon. Ever-secretive Apple rarely makes big, splashy acquisitions; that could change if the right bargain comes along.
5. Google, $12.7 billion
   A slumping share price may mean more acquisitions done for cash.
6. Intel, $12.0 billion
   Intel's chip factories require billions of dollars in investment; count on Intel to spend its money there, rather than on cute Web companies.
7. Nokia, $10.8 billion
   Like Cisco, Nokia's eager to be more of a Web player. Blogging and lifecasting are particular areas of interest. The cell-phone maker could throw investors a curveball and buy, say, Six Apart, Automattic, or Tumblr.
8. Dell, $9.0 billion
   Dell could have more cash on its hands if it manages to sell its PC factories, a move it's considering as HP chips away at its business. On the shopping list: software and services.
9. Motorola, $7.2 billion
   It's hard to see Motorola being an active acquirer until it figures out what to do with its cell-phone business.
10. Taiwan Semiconductor, $7.0 billion
    AMD's only worth $2.6 billion, and TSMC already makes some chips for it. Why not just buy it?

We've been focused too much on software and content, even though we know there's someone from SanDisk who just flipped their lid on the playa. Likewise, there must be some poor pacifist at PA Semi who, all too happy to get sold to Apple, learned they had to continue engineering chip fab designs for jets, subs and choppers. I mean, c'mon, AMD minions, can you come up with no good dirt on Intel executives? I yearn to hear the stories from the actual front lines of technology, and not from the front of the line at the British Bankers Club or 111 Minna. Do tell. (Photo by Marcin Wichary)

By selling off its fab plants, it could hopefully turn around its $1 billion-plus losses. Tom's Hardware Guide spinoff TG Daily now cites "sources" — don't you hate those? I know I do — who claim the split is only weeks away. Here's what's really happening: The split is real. The "leaks" and "sources" are AMD's way of letting the market know what's up without formally committing to it in a statement.

VeriSign chairman Jim Bidzos
An employee's advice to senior management:

Don't drag out the divestiture process in an effort to get a few extra bucks. And if you're going to kill the whole thing, be honest with employees about opportunities.

AMD chairman and CEO Hector Ruiz
An employee's advice to senior management:

AMD needs to go back to basics. What business is AMD in, who do you need onboard to lead the company in that business, who do you need that can create demand for the product, and what do the customers want? Ignore the "how" and focus on the "who." Stop treating employees like costs and more like assets. Threatening cubical hoteling and pushing the "do more with less" story is oppressive, not inspiring. The most marketable talent will leave first.

EMC CEO and chairman Joe Tucci
An employee's advice to senior management:

Senior management needs to respect its employees, listen to feedback and not bury its head in the sand as it relates to issues of sexism and lack of diversity. The culture continues to be predominantly young white men and this is largely because people hire who they know. "Breaking the glass ceiling" requires a lot of sacrifice! They will cite a few examples of high profile women, but these are the exception, not the rule. Work/life balance is not a priority in this company. Most of the highest ranking professional women in this organization are unmarried or do not have children. They need to recognize the need for more flexible work options that promote the importance of family. And most importantly, there need to be consequences for illegal and unethical behavior, regardless of who commits it! People cannot be protected from this. There are too many blind eyes turned when sexual harassment, illegal business practices, or other unethical acts occur.

Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang

An employee's advice to senior management:

Be more open to the workforce opinions. Be more humble. Be less political. Listen more, do more, and quickly.

eBay CEO John Donahoe
An employee's advice to senior management:

Streamline the process so people can focus more on getting their work done. Share more of the details of the vision for eBay and the competition of eBay.

Symantec CEO John Thompson
An employee's advice to senior management:

Open your eyes to how the actually successful companies are doing it. Use your talent pool and clear the way to innovate internally. Shift the focus from salesmanship to inherent quality. Build products that sell themselves rather than needing an aggresive sales cycle to move.

Hewlett-Packard chairman, president and CEO Mark Hurd
An employee's advice to senior management:

Stop screwing the employees. Stop reducing benefits every week. Stop saying you plan to invest in research and development when you are actually reducing everything except your bonuses. Start treating people as people. Get some moral fiber.

EDS chairman, president and CEO Ron Rittenmeyer
An employee's advice to senior management:

As I said above, either learn to trust the junior leadership you put into place or replace them. Set goals and then GET OUT OF THE WAY and allow the leadership the flexibility to execute to them. If they don't perform, release them. The micromanagement culture has to stop.

IBM chairman, president and CEO Sam Palmisano
An employee's advice to senior management:

One thing is missing though, an acceptance of the fact that there are "superstars" in the world, and that these superstars perform several orders of magnitude better than regular employees. What is missing within IBM is the ability to seek out, and nourish these superstars. Over time superstars will leave IBM because they will get much more recognition in other organizations. This has an impact on IBM's ability to deliver some things.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer
An employee's advice to senior management:

There is a severe lack of leadership in the company. With so many things going on it takes executives too long to commit to business decisions and too long to pick up on competitive responses to disruptive technologies.Microsoft promotes based on 2 facets - technical knowledge and political saavy. What Microsoft does not promote based on is leadership ability, managerial ability or business saavy.

(Photo of Ballmer by AP/Sarbach)

The new branding effort will solve a problem of AMD's own making; with the purchase of ATI, a graphics-chip company, AMD signaled that it was more interested in winning business from videogamers and other consumers. Intel, meanwhile, remained the safe choice for companies to buy; no purchasing executive would blink at approving an order for PCs with Intel inside.

For years, Ruiz tried to beat Intel on technical prowess alone — "multicore" chips, "hyperthreading," and so on. That worked for a while: People were so amazed that AMD, long an Intel copycat, was beating its rival, that they bought more chips, perhaps out of the sheer novelty of it all. That Ruiz is now thinking about how his chips are packaged and sold is wise. But late.

(Photoillustration via Hexus)

According to Google's translation tools, it reads: "We are pleased Smart Net company to offer you our services in the design, development and hosting sites." Sure, I'm not interested in buying any of those things, but I'm glad there's a market to be reached where the buyers and the sellers of such Web services both write in Arabic.

It helps me remember that the most popular Facebook group in the Saudi Arabian network is "Single and Looking in Saudi Arabia" and that merchants like those who resold AMD's products have fostered an entrepreneurial class in Dubai which promises to make the emirate less oil dependent and more progressive than its neighbors.

Last year, the Bush administration said the AMD chips got inside roadside bombs due to unscrupulous merchants from Dubai who resold them at a higher price to Iranians. The UAE responded with promises to create a new export control law. But such laws have had "virtually had no effect, to be honest," Iranian trade expert Nasser Hashempour told the Times. "If someone wants to move something — get it to Iran — it is easy to be done." An AMD spokesman told the Times it binds customers to agreements to not resell products to Iran.

Hi Owen,

On Monday, February 25, senior AMD executives will be hosting a cocktail reception from 6 pm - 8 pm PT at the Marriott San Francisco (full logistics below). While no news will be discussed, it's a rare opportunity that we have so many senior-level executives across all divisions (server, desktop, mobile, graphics) together at the same time. We thought you'd enjoy the opportunity to network with these AMD executives and talk to them about our business and broader industry trends such as energy efficient PCs, new form factor computing devices, the ever increasing graphics demands of computers today, and virtualization in the datacenter, in a more informal setting.

Let me know if you'd like to attend and I will confirm your attendance.

AMD Executive Cocktail Reception

What: Informal networking reception with senior AMD executives

When: Monday, February 25th; 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm PT

Where:

Marriott San Francisco

55 4th St

San Francisco, CA 94103

Who: Senior-level executives across all business units