Former AMD chief executive Hector Ruiz abruptly left his position as chairman of Globalfoundries Monday, after published reports linked him to the Galleon Group insider trading scandal.

In a short statement, Globalfoundries said Ruiz "will take a voluntary leave of absence effective immediately." The company added that Ruiz had submitted his resignation in September and planned to resign Jan. 4.

Alan E. "Lanny" Ross, a member of Globalfoundries' board, will serve as interim chairman of the semiconductor foundry until a permanent chairman is appointed. Ross, previously president and CEO of Broadcom, has also worked at various semiconductor companies including National Semiconductor, Fairchild Semiconductor and Worldwide Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation.

Last week, the Wall Street Journal named Ruiz as the person who allegedly shared insider information with Danielle Chiesi, a defendant in the criminal case in which hedge fund Galleon has been charged with trading on insider information. All of the defendants in the case have said they are innocent. Ruiz has not been named by prosecutors and AMD and Globalfoundaries have said they are not aware of any criminal misconduct by any current or past employees in the case.

The Galleon case has already claimed the position of another highly placed industry executive in the person of Robert Moffat, a senior IBM vice president, who has stepped down from Big Blue's Systems and Technology group.

Born in Mexico, Ruiz earned a PhD. in electrical engineering in the U.S. before rising through the ranks at both Texas Instruments and Motorola. He joined AMD in 2000 and for a few years the company prospered under his leadership as the company battled over processors with Intel, its arch rival. In recent quarters, however, AMD reported growing losses and the company paid a whopping $5.4 billion for graphics chip specialist ATI Technologies, which saddled AMD with heavy debt.

Several high tech companies including Intel and Akamai have also been dragged into the scandal, although no current employees of either company have been named as participants in the controversy. Galleon, run by former high tech investor and analyst, Raj Rajaratnam, has been liquidating its assets since the U.S. Attorney's office in Manhattan and the SEC filed their respective complaints last month.

Globalfoundaries has heavy AMD involvement with at least four of its eight directors having AMD connections. They are: Giuliano Meroni, president EMEA AMD; Bob Palmer, AMD board member; Bob Rivet, chief operating and administrative officer, AMD; and Katy Wells, AMD corporate secretary.

AMD has a substantial, but minority ownership interest in Globalfoundaries.

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