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AMD’s CEO, Lisa Su, grew up in Queens and obtained three degrees from MIT.
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She’s credited with turning AMD into a roughly $270 billion powerhouse and rival to Nvidia in AI chips.
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Here is a look at her career rise, personal life, and challenges over the years.
Lisa Su is the engineer behind one of the most dramatic corporate turnarounds in the tech industry.
The Taiwanese American CEO is widely credited with transforming AMD from a struggling semiconductor firm on the brink of collapse into a global powerhouse competing head-to-head with Intel and Nvidia.
When Su joined AMD in 2012, the company’s market value was under $2 billion. Within a decade of her leadership, AMD’s innovations in high-performance computing and graphics, especially the Ryzen CPUs and EPYC server processors, catapulted the company’s value to roughly $270 billion as of October 2025.
But Su’s leadership has not been without challenges. AMD’s two largest competitors, Nvidia and Intel, are now working together in a strategic collaboration. Under the second Trump administration, export regulations related to China, one of AMD’s largest markets, are also constantly changing.
Here’s a look at the timeline of Su’s career, from her early life in New York City to her role as one of the most influential women in tech and innovation:
Early life, family
Lisa Tzwu-Fang Su was born in Tainan, Taiwan, in 1969, to Su Chun-hwai and Sandy Lo. Her family immigrated to the US when she was around the age of three, because her father, a statistician, was pursuing his graduate studies at the University of Texas in Austin. Her mother at that time was an accountant. The family eventually settled down in Queens, New York City.
As a child, Su liked to take apart and rebuild remote-controlled cars and other gadgets, which sparked her interest in engineering. She eventually attended The Bronx High School of Science and graduated in 1986.
Education
Su attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston for many years and focused on electrical engineering. She eventually completed her bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees all at MIT throughout the 1990s.
Su’s doctoral work on MOSFETs — tiny electronic switches inside computer chips — helped cement her future in some of the world’s best-known semiconductor companies.
Semiconductor research
After leaving the academic environment, Su worked in engineering, research, and managerial positions at Texas Instruments, IBM, and Freescale Semiconductor.
As the lead scientist at the IBM Semiconductor R&D Center, she contributed to the development of copper interconnects in chips, replacing aluminum ones. Her later role as senior vice president and general manager at Freescale, where she prepared the company for its IPO, gave Su the experience she needed to take on roles beyond research.
-
AMD’s CEO, Lisa Su, grew up in Queens and obtained three degrees from MIT.
-
She’s credited with turning AMD into a roughly $270 billion powerhouse and rival to Nvidia in AI chips.
-
Here is a look at her career rise, personal life, and challenges over the years.
Lisa Su is the engineer behind one of the most dramatic corporate turnarounds in the tech industry.
The Taiwanese American CEO is widely credited with transforming AMD from a struggling semiconductor firm on the brink of collapse into a global powerhouse competing head-to-head with Intel and Nvidia.
When Su joined AMD in 2012, the company’s market value was under $2 billion. Within a decade of her leadership, AMD’s innovations in high-performance computing and graphics, especially the Ryzen CPUs and EPYC server processors, catapulted the company’s value to roughly $270 billion as of October 2025.
But Su’s leadership has not been without challenges. AMD’s two largest competitors, Nvidia and Intel, are now working together in a strategic collaboration. Under the second Trump administration, export regulations related to China, one of AMD’s largest markets, are also constantly changing.
Here’s a look at the timeline of Su’s career, from her early life in New York City to her role as one of the most influential women in tech and innovation:
Early life, family
Lisa Tzwu-Fang Su was born in Tainan, Taiwan, in 1969, to Su Chun-hwai and Sandy Lo. Her family immigrated to the US when she was around the age of three, because her father, a statistician, was pursuing his graduate studies at the University of Texas in Austin. Her mother at that time was an accountant. The family eventually settled down in Queens, New York City.
As a child, Su liked to take apart and rebuild remote-controlled cars and other gadgets, which sparked her interest in engineering. She eventually attended The Bronx High School of Science and graduated in 1986.
Education
Su attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston for many years and focused on electrical engineering. She eventually completed her bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees all at MIT throughout the 1990s.
Su’s doctoral work on MOSFETs — tiny electronic switches inside computer chips — helped cement her future in some of the world’s best-known semiconductor companies.
Semiconductor research
After leaving the academic environment, Su worked in engineering, research, and managerial positions at Texas Instruments, IBM, and Freescale Semiconductor.
As the lead scientist at the IBM Semiconductor R&D Center, she contributed to the development of copper interconnects in chips, replacing aluminum ones. Her later role as senior vice president and general manager at Freescale, where she prepared the company for its IPO, gave Su the experience she needed to take on roles beyond research.
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