When Lattice Semiconductor’s CEO quit last year, so did many of the Hillsboro company’s investors.
Jim Anderson had led Lattice through a massive turnaround, and investors feared for its future as Anderson left to run a bigger company. Lattice’s stock plunged by 15% in a single day, shedding $1.6 billion in market value.
So when Lattice hired Anderson’s replacement, it went all out. The company chose veteran technology executive and investor Ford Tamer last September, luring him away from the investment firm Francisco Partners with an eye-popping pay package the company valued at $94 million.
It’s the most — by far — any Oregon company paid its top executive last year, according to the annual review of regional executive compensation by The Oregonian/OregonLive.
It’s also 1,300 times what Lattice’s median employee makes each year, $72,000, regulatory filings show. That’s the biggest gap between executive and worker pay of any Oregon company.
Federal rules require most companies to disclose their executive pay every year and compare it to what workers make. Though Lattice’s headquarters are in Hillsboro, Tamer lives in California.
Nearly all of his compensation comes through one-time, new-hire stock grants that become valuable if the company hits various performance targets. Should Lattice thrive, Tamer could make even more — or far less, if the business falters. And Lattice said it doesn’t expect to pay Tamer nearly as much this year, or to give him any more stock grants before 2026.
Still, is any CEO worth $94 million?
Investors appear to think so. Lattice’s share price jumped 12% the day it hired Tamer, increasing its market value by $762 million.
By that metric, perhaps, Lattice shareholders have already gotten their money’s worth. Amid a prolonged downturn in demand for Lattice’s programmable chips, though, its stock is still far below the peaks it hit under Tamer’s predecessor.
CEO pay has been a continuing source of fascination, and controversy, as top executives’ earnings far outpace growth in workers’ wages. All of Oregon’s major, publicly traded companies pay their top executives more than $1 million a year, and some pay 10 or 20 times that amount (or, in Lattice’s case, 90 times).
Intel says it paid former CEO Pat Gelsinger almost $28 million last year, including severance payments issued after the board forced him out in December. However, Gelsinger also forfeited various stock awards, including some associated with his hiring in 2021.
Gelsinger received almost 300 timesthe $96,000 the median Intel worker earned. (Intel’s headquarters are in California, where Gelsinger lives, but its largest operations are in Oregon.)
Nike paid new CEO Elliott Hill about $27 million last year, including $20 million in stock grants and stock options. The company said its median worker earned a little less than $50,000 last year. Hill’s compensation was 545 times that sum.
Oregon’s public utilities have some of the smallest gaps between executive and worker pay. That’s partly because their executives earn less than the people running other large companies, and partly because their median workers earn more.
For example, NW Natural paid CEO David Anderson $4.1 million and the median employee earned about $131,000. That’s a ratio of 32-to-1.
Portland tax
For the past several years, publicly traded companies operating in Portland have been assessed a surcharge on their city business taxes when they pay their CEOs at least 10 times more than their median worker.
Portland doesn’t disclose what each company pays, only the aggregate amount, which was $6.7 million in 2023. That’s the most recent figure for which the city has data, but it’s still preliminary and will probably rise as businesses report their final tax obligations.
The city’s CEO tax hasn’t had any discernible influence on executive pay, nor much impact on the city budget. It represents less than 1% of the city’s general fund collections.
The tax has served as a barometer of what’s happening in the corporate world, though. Collections have more than doubled since Portland first levied the surcharge in 2017, suggesting that executive pay disparities appear to be widening.
This is Oregon Insight, The Oregonian’s weekly look at the numbers behind the state’s economy. View past installments here.
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