Lisa Su, the trailblazing CEO of Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), has delivered one of the most remarkable corporate turnarounds in the semiconductor industry’s history. Under her leadership since 2014, AMD has evolved from a struggling underdog into a $378 billion tech powerhouse, outpacing industry giants like Bank of America, Home Depot, and Procter & Gamble in market capitalization. Her strategic vision, especially AMD’s push into AI hardware, has captivated investors and recently sent the stock soaring 41% in a single week following the company’s partnership with OpenAI. Yet, despite steering this massive transformation and making countless investors rich, Lisa Su’s own net worth pales in comparison to many of her peers in the tech world. Unlike Nvidia’s Jensen Huang, whose $167 billion fortune places him among the world’s wealthiest individuals, Su is estimated by Forbes to have a net worth of just $1.5 billion barely enough to make her a billionaire.
The key difference comes down to ownership. Jensen Huang co-founded Nvidia and still retains close to a 4% stake in the company, which is now valued at an astonishing $4.7 trillion. That equity alone is worth over $160 billion. In contrast, Su did not found AMD it was launched back in 1969 by engineers from Fairchild Semiconductor, with Jerry Sanders serving as its first CEO. Su joined decades later and currently owns about 4.7 million AMD shares, or a 0.3% stake, which is worth around $1.1 billion at current valuations. While her total compensation package including salary, stock options, and bonuses was approximately $31 million last year, it’s her limited equity that significantly restricts her personal fortune compared to other tech moguls.
The disparity becomes even more apparent when comparing Su to founders like Oracle’s Larry Ellison, who still owns roughly 41% of his company. With Oracle’s market value exceeding $847 billion, Ellison’s stake alone is worth more than $350 billion, making him the second-richest person in the world after Elon Musk. Seven of the ten wealthiest individuals globally are company founders, and the remaining few like Musk and Warren Buffett have shaped their companies so profoundly that they are synonymous with them. Even Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer, who wasn’t a founder, capitalized on a unique early contract to amass a vast equity position. In that context, Su’s journey as a transformational but non-founding CEO limits her upward mobility on the billionaire charts.
Nonetheless, Lisa Su’s impact on AMD’s resurgence cannot be overstated. Since she took the reins, the stock has multiplied more than 70 times. This year alone, shares have nearly doubled as investors rally behind her long-term vision to build an integrated ecosystem for AI spanning chips, software, and services. While she may not yet sit atop rich lists, Su’s influence in the tech world is immense. Her leadership has positioned AMD as one of the most exciting players in the semiconductor arms race, particularly in the competition to supply chips for the burgeoning AI revolution. Her ability to engineer such a remarkable comeback in a fiercely competitive market has earned her industry-wide respect, even if it hasn’t translated into the staggering personal wealth seen among founder-CEOs.
Su’s case illustrates a broader truth in the world of tech wealth: founding and maintaining significant ownership in a company is still the most reliable path to extreme financial success. Equity is everything. For now, Su remains a billionaire but far from the upper echelons of wealth. Still, with AMD’s momentum accelerating and institutional backing surging, her net worth could climb significantly in the years to come. If current trends continue and AMD’s stock price keeps rising, Lisa Su might soon see her personal fortune align more closely with the transformative value she has created for shareholders.
