- LISA SU
CEO ADVANCED
MICRO DEVICES (AMD
3. JENSEN
HUANG
CEO NVIDIA
4. REED
HASTINGS
CO-CEO NETFLIX
5. ELIZABETH
GAINES
CEO FORTESCUE
METALS GROUP
THRIVING THROUGH ADVERSITY
In a year dominated by crisis and uncertainty, these leaders stood out.
To create our annual ranking of star executives, we first screen for 10 metrics ranging from return on capital to
total return to investors. Then we identify those who achieved the remarkable. Here, the rest of the top 20:Su’s strategic vision to lift
Advanced Micro Devices
from near-bankruptcy to
the pinnacle of PC proces-
sors has taken a few years
to realize. But now that the
high-performance Zen chip
design AMD first envisioned
six years ago is in its third
generation of actual prod-
ucts, sales are booming,
reaching almost $9 billion
over the past 12 months, a
44% gain from the prior
year. And AMD’s stock price,
under $2 a share in 2016, re-
cently crossed $85—giving
the company a stock mar-
ket value of more than
$100 billion. Su is looking
to stoke further gains by us-
ing AMD’s stock to buy rival
Xilinx for $35 billion to
crack the chip market for
cars and 5G mobile devices.
—Aaron PressmanNvidia has sold the fastest
graphics processing chips
for playing video games for
most of its 27-year history.
But the reason Nvidia over-
took Intel in 2020 as the
most valuable U.S. chip-
maker started with CEO and
cofounder Jensen Huang’s
realization that those same
kinds of chips would also
be well-suited for machine
learning, artificial intelli-
gence, and big data analy-
sis—not to mention mining
cryptocurrency too. Nvid-
ia’s stock price has gained
122% this year, giving
Huang the currency to
make a big acquisition. For
$40 billion, he’s betting on
chip-design powerhouse
ARM to help Nvidia get even
deeper into cloud comput-
ing and smart devices.
—A.P.Over the past year, a host
of formidable new competi-
tors have challenged Netflix
in the streaming wars—from
Disney+ to NBC’s Peacock
to Apple TV+ to HBO Max.
But the company was pre-
pared, having made big
investments in original pro-
gramming and its deep
content library. It’s a strat-
egy that’s proved especially
prescient during the pan-
demic, with Netflix set to
emerge a winner. The com-
pany added 28 million sub-
scribers in the first nine
months of 2020—more than
it gained for all of 2019—
and is on track to hit a new
annual record. The share
price has also been hitting
new highs, with the stock
returning 60% over the past
12 months.
—Beth KowittGaines defied the odds in
a year defined by a global
pandemic and fast-souring
relations between Australia
and China, Fortescue’s
main market. In fact, the
$12.8 billion iron ore pro-
ducer had a banner year,
posting record-breaking fi-
nancial results, and a 137%
total return for investors
over the past 12 months.
Those results owe much to
the speedy recovery and
soaring demand of China’s
steel industry, which de-
spite the pandemic, will
have its biggest year ever in- Meanwhile, Gaines
implemented safeguards to
make sure the virus didn’t
hobble her operations; so
far there have been zero
cases of Covid at Fortes-
cue’s mining sites.
—Erika Fry
BUSINESSPERSON OF THE YEAR • 6– 20BUSINESSPERSON OF THE YEAR • 1. ELON MUSK
SEE FULL PROFILES OF ALL OUR 20 BUSINESSPEOPLE OF THE YEAR AT FORTUNE.COM.- LEONARD SCHLEIFER
CEO Regeneron
Pharmaceuticals - J E F F B E ZO S
CEO Amazon
8. SHANTANU NARAYEN
CEO Adobe- AJAY BANGA
CEO Mastercard
International
1 0. TRICIA GRIFFITH
CEO Progressive- KEN XIE
CEO Fortinet
12. PETER WENNINK
CEO ASML Holding
13. DAVID POWERS
CEO Deckers Outdoor
14. JULIE SWEET
CEO Accenture
15. KRISTIN PECK
CEO Zoetis
16. SASAN GOODARZI
CEO Intuit
17. DANIEL ZHANG
CEO Alibaba Group
Holding
1 8. ADENA FRIEDMAN
CEO Nasdaq- BRUCE BROUSSARD
CEO Humana
20. CYNTHIA WARNER
CEO Renewable Energy
GroupFROM LEFT: MARK LENNIHAN—AP PHOTO; PATRICK T. FALLON—BLOOMBERGGETTY IMAGES; ERNESTO S. RUSCIO—GETTY IMAGESNETFLIX; CLAIRE MARTIN