Thread regarding Intel Corp. layoffs

Calling TSMC “a fast follower” and not doing base research is probably the most delusional comment I have seen yet.
For example they did hybrid bonding way before Intel did for HVM.

I am very hopeful when I finally see Intel cutting wasteful projects that generate zero revenue. It is time we start behaving like a real going concern.

Fire the board and hire 10 top electronics inventors ! Next innovation please ! Mad scientist and Steve Jobs back !

Since TSMC took the lead their wafer costs have risen dramatically, as their R&D budget has skyrocketed.

They pass the costs along but it also means that that the cost advantage they have over Intel is actually a lot smaller than it once was. Labor cost is still a big difference, and that is both due to salary and utilization. No one is idling in the cafe at TSMC.

Their customers are finding that the big cost savings they got from going fabless are being quickly eroded, plus they have gained an existential risk from having TSMC as their sole supplier. That is lose-lose.

Intel can save quite a bit of money by merely remaining close to TSMC, slightly ahead or behind from time to time, but generally try to stay close (while focused on cost).

That is good enough as a foundry and at the times that Intel doesn't have the lead it can continue to contract out to TSMC. Intel was TSMCs first customer and there is plenty of room for 2 or 3 large foundries (If Samsung figures out how to stay close as well).

Like any other technology, each company has a certain scale and that determines their capital strategy for cycling Profits into R&D. Whichever is the largest is ultimately going to own the most R&D, and that means they also own taking the most risk.

Be careful what you wish for.

A product is something you sell for money. All the b.s. 'enabling' projects are not products at all.

Intel is broke, all the stupid cost centers that don't generate income are getting cut.

Look at the mumbo jumbo the last poster put up... Read it. This is what is wrong with Intel.

"Intel has a large portfolio of products which were intended to help the company be seen as a full datacenter provider, and in some cases help push various technologies in ways that benefited Intel or some market niche."

"Intel has a large portofolio of products which were intended to help the company be seen as a full datacenter provider, and in some cases help push various technologies in ways that benefited Intel or some market niche."

@eg By the way I wasn't speaking about EUV, but know that Intel did all the pathfinding on EUV and TSMC up to that point had been pursuing a fast-follower strategy.

TSMC & Samsung would let Intel do all the basic research, then pick what seemed the most promising.

TSMC is in packaging and many other technologies than just making semi chips, and they have greatly benefited from Intel R&D in the past, as Intel drove technology.

Being a fast follower is cheaper than being in the lead, which is why companies often take that strategy.

By focusing on the core, Intel is removing the ability of many companies to be a fast follower. LBT is putting an end to that grift.

@eg You are being argumentative to what is a relatively simple statement of facts.

If you really want to understand what LBT and the Board are doing, read what I stated again, but without all the hyperbole that is clearly twisting up your thoughts.

When LBT says he is going to reduce Intel focus to core products, that is CEO-speak for 'we are not the market leader and can't afford to keep funding products and services which made sense when we had 80% market share'

This is in line with the comment about needing 50% GM to approve any new products.

Intel is (for the moment at least), out of the business of squandering endless billions trying to cover as many of the product and service needs that the Datacenter may need.

What the company will have to offer will be more limited than before, excluding things like Clear Linux, NEX and others that will be one-by-one disaggregated from the portfolio of products and services that Intel will offer.

Having lost market dominance means the company no longer has the extra billions it needs to fund anything that does not product a profit. Some call all these wasted efforts grifting or whatever, but it was a market strategy that made sense when the company dominated market, and has not made sense for at least 10 years.

The competition and customers all were getting a free ride from Intel, and will now need to fund their own development, plain and simple.

@e9
Why didn't you just tell us all you worked for Brookfield Asset Management or Bane Capital. Now we understand the slash and burn Fire Sale. The comments about letting TSMC have all the nextgen nodes because we all know that decision worked so well back in 2010 and 2011 when our two biggest competitors leaped ahead in EUV leaving Intel stuck at 14++++.

@e9
"Let AMD and NVDA fund all that other stuff and Intel can just focus on the core product."

Sorry, I missed something? What are those core products and whose lunch is being eaten daily in Server/AI marketplace. I guess I'm not in the know regarding Intel's re-emergence in the Cell Phone market later this year with the Super Atom Cell Processor;1000 TOPs running at 500miliwatts and fits on the head of a Thumb Tack. 😂

@e2 I can't speak to the merits of the product but Intel has a large portofolio of products which were intended to help the company be seen as a full datacenter provider, and in some cases help push various technologies in ways that benefited Intel or some market niche.

The company is in the process of removing non-core products and activities, and this seems to fit that effort. Also consider that Intel is no longer the dominant server market player, and there is no reason to expect that to return unless the company were to take on AMD in CPU and NVDA in AI/GPU.

Certainly the company will try to compete but it can no longer afford to fund products and services which only ever existed as part of a strategy to maintain server market dominance.

Also consider that there are other linux products and this one may no longer have been leading edge.

Part of what both the Client and Datacenter lose when market domination is lost is all the R&D and tangential products that market leader created as part of their effort to maintian market dominance.

Let AMD and NVDA fund all that other stuff and Intel can just focus on the core product.

Same is true for foundry, where all the non-core things that TD was funding now get stopped, to focus on just what Intel needs. Let TSMC fund R&D for all that stuff.

These markets (and in some cases competitiors) can no longer have it both ways.

@e2 I don't think you know much about Linux... Ki-ling ClearLinux doesn't mean anything about what Intel does with Linux, at all. This was just a stupid project that only served someone's ego.

@aq
It's really funny how uninformed most Tech Employee's are. The Internet runs on Linux, several of the newest AI OS's are derived from Linux. Intel's investment in this space was as a development platform to ensure the H/W for Servers was working without a hitch at top performance. I would not be surprised if AMD picks this up and runs with it! Couple of informational links for all you Trogs that need informing.
https://gitnux.org/server-statistics/
https://www.wmtips.com/technologies/operating-systems/
https://www.walturn.com/insights/best-ai-operating-systems-a-comprehensive-overview

This is a "Clear" loss in the long run and you might as well just give away the largest profit source for Intel. This was not my project and I am not a programmer but I bet all those involved will be signing up to work for any FAANG in the near future.

Not a damned bit of marketshare data in any of this thread. No indication for the business this distribution is driving. If it's simply the shiny object, it will go away. Another example of wasted resource Intel can't execute to capitalize

Can only think of one person who would vote negative to every comment about this post. Dude, go get a real job: your little project is dead, nobody really liked you, little dictator. Your skills might get you a job at McDonald's if you are lucky enough.

Clear Linux was still around!?

@am agree with you 100% Somehow he's managing to survive within the company after years of no real contributions which highlights the problems with the company.

Money pit with no meaningful benefits.

@ab but that person still there when his entire team has been checked out….imho this guy should have been kicked out first….nothing came out of this guy other than politics. What waste of intel $$$.

Easy decision. This activity does not generate and revenue at all. Just a big, fat expense.

Finally! It never made any sense other than serving the ego of the main driver of the project as well as his career. Something good coming out of all this. What's been the ROI of this thing?