By Mike Feibus

A few short hours after the Consumer Electronics Show finished setting the stage for the industry's year, AMD added a new wrinkle to the outlook when it revealed that CEO Dirk Meyer was leaving. Effective immediately.

Meyer likely was a casualty of an increasingly fierce debate at AMD over what the tablet market means to the company and how it should respond. Meyer laid his cards on the table, both publicly and privately, asserting that tablets are companion devices that would not have a major detrimental impact on the PC market. Intel CEO Paul Otellini says much the same, by the way.

Intel, though, has a well-articulated strategy for addressing the tablet market, which is dominated by ARM-based processors, with its Atom series of x86 CPUs. So too does Nvidia, executing on a years-long plan to attack the market with Tegra, an ARM-based platform.

In fact, virtually every player has a strategy for the tablet market but AMD. Thus far, AMD has signaled that it would let Intel pave the way and then follow its rival into the market as an x86 player. But the sky-is-falling contingent at AMD, which advocates taking Nividia's lead rather than Intel's, reportedly has gained momentum in recent months. They would have the company develop or buy an ARM core to combine with its in-house graphics technology.

Meyer deserves some of the blame for the company's waffling, and his sudden ouster suggests that AMD has decided to go down the ARM path. This much already has been speculated in the media since AMD announced Meyer's resignation on January 10.

What's been glossed over in the hubbub, though, is that AMD's board designated Chief Financial Officer Thomas Seifert as the interim CEO. This suggests that the decision of whether to make- or-buy into an ARM platform already has been made -- and the verdict is buy.

Prediction: AMD will merge with FreeScale Semiconductor

I'm about to pile some speculation on top of that double dose of conjecture. So take it for what it's worth. Ready?

Here it goes: AMD will be merging with FreeScale Semiconductor. The combination no doubt looks attractive to a board that wants an ARM license and design portfolio yesterday. You could also make the case that it looks good from a company culture point of view, as there is already a lot of cross-pollination between the two companies.