Thread regarding Intel Corp. layoffs

Intel will fail bad! 10 years ago as I was inventing a lot of things for Intel. (IP stuff). I found out the hard way that Intel does not want innovators. You will be attacked by your manager and co-workers if you are a star employee.

I quit innovating about 8 years ago and simply played politics to work the the least amount possibe for the most money. Politics at Intel is the only way to survive!

I get that Intel foundry is more complex to use but is it actually also more expensive? What happened to all that song and dance about being the leader on cost per transistor?

Why the foundry is still floundering? It's our complicated design rules with lots of bells and whistles that are customized for CPU. No serious external customer would ever want that, right? Why would they sink in a lot of time to debug and follow our design rules when they have a good ecosystem with the competitor already? By the time we're supposedly finished producing their product on the latest cutting edge process, the taiwan competitor may have already closed gap. Foundry needs to seriously compete on reducing costs if they are to win serious clients.

Yep -- Circuit has become a propaganda machine. Lots of internal cheerleaders posting comments vs. healthy critical debate. And its likely going to get worse unless the company returns to its roots. Unfortunately, the Progressive mentality has entrenched itself at the exec staff level ... and Progressive agenda items like "D&I" are pushed down our throats. And there are FT people employed to push this BS! either through FT bloggers (Progressive-agenda 'cheerleaders') or those in HR employed to to "social engineering" to use large amounts of company $ to 'grease the skids' to develop a URM Pipeline for future URM hiring.

In the last 9 years, since the iPhone disruption has started, the following companies melted down due to hubris:

Nokia, Blackberry (RIM), Intel (Slow decline - Shift to Cloud), Microsoft (Shift to cloud).

But there are companies that took advantage of the new Era: Apple, Samsung, Google.

Apple & Samsung are veterans who were able to be flexible and ride the new wave. It is interesting to see what is the difference in attitude that made them succeed.

I remembered so many conversations with my boss, demand they justify everything they ask. It is work for us to do what they ask, make sure the ROI is there, challenge them on everything. WTF, doesn't the customer know what they want, you think our internal teams are that stupid? Yes they are that stupid! Is it any wonder nobody likes working with us. I hear that is our approach internally and externally. Our arrogance about how we are so good is our downfall. I have yet to meet a senior manager with an open mind to listen to my proposals and alternatives. It was always my way or the the highway. The only time I could get a change was to subtly convince the boss or the bosses bosses it was really his idea, or it wouldn't happen. Is it any wonder we have no external business, and any we get is because we promise something we don't have, listen to the customer can do wonders.

As to ARM, what is our competitive advantage, cost, speed, efficiency, customer service, we have none of that as we've been spoiled and become so arrogant in our x86 little monopoly where we build it and whatever features we have it is what you get at the price we name and trust me it is good and what you want. LOL

The whole industry, both the chip industry, the software, the design hate the arrogance and insular attitude of this company.

It will take an external CEO with great vision, great energy and great charisma to shake this place loose, and what is the chance of that happening? LOL

"Over the last three months I have conducted numerous project reviews with our execution teams, and there is a clear trend that has emerged in these reviews — a lack of product/customer focus in execution that is creating schedule and competitiveness gaps in our products" - Murthy

Altera uses ARM cores (A53).

So Intel is already licensing it.

I foresee us getting back into ARM cores (as a licensee) as a part of our IoT push. If we haven't already.

Good comments on custom foundry. I am not familiar with the issues. Was it a problem with tooling not matching ASIC industry standards? I know Altera has had a hell of a time getting something out on 14nm. We also see that the Infineon modem team still uses TSMC here in 2016 while they were bought by Intel in 2011.

What good is a process lead if you can't use it?

Intel doesn't have a process advantage. At least for mobile SoC

Giving up on phones is monumentally retarded.

Out of all of the 'things' in IoT, the smartphone is the most important 'thing ' and most profitable one for companies that can execute.

The clown show that was Atom should have been done very differently. How about using ARM CPUs and leveraging the process advantage? The NIH at Intel is mind bogglingly stupid.

Engineers at Intel have been screaming for a decade or more about really focusing on the customer, user experience, developing their own cell phone, etc. It really is true that upper management ignores what the customer wants. They put on blinders on where the industry was going. They gave up on cell phones. Seriously? Are you kidding? What a waste. I am sad and shocked. Intel was a great company. Challenging the status quo used to be rewarded. I loved working there and was proud to walk into the door each day because innovation mattered. My voice mattered. Somewhere in the last 8 to 10 years, they completely lost their way. It's a shame. There are tons of amazing engineers there. Too bad upper management has their heads up their bum. From an ex fab engineer with 15 years....

Going the way to become the next DEC or Xerox, heads or tails, you call it, LOL

OP dude... you don't sound like an Intelier, we genuine Inteliers not only state the issues, we also provide solutions. In fact we provide pages and pages of 'data', options, scenarios, pro & cons solutions on powerpoint. Where's yours?

I would add Intel foundry to the list of failures. It started as a great thing. Great job OP, great job.

OP. Congratulations on your awareness.

You forgot Eric Kim who was brought in from Samsung to revamp marketing. He unveiled a great concept ad which was of course never used. Soon after that he was gone.

The internal propaganda machine isn't helping one bit, either. Those who read the darned thing would know exactly what I'm talking about.

Well done OP. but people all for a solution and there is none. Intel had the x86 moat and process drawbridge. Both served to protect the Intel fort. However the huge capital requirements of running a fab can be a real problem if you can't keep them full. TSMC doesn't pick the winners it just serves them. X86 is also like a closed source in a world that's increasingly becoming more open. Truth be told Intel can't be saved because the market it served no longer exists.

What if you borrow to buy a house and the value of the house goes down (aka Altera and the value of Intel stock during the buyback)?

It doesn't matter what the interest rate is if you're underwater on your asset.

The increase in debt isn't per se a problem - borrowing is essentially free right now. However, it is more leverage, and that while that will goose the returns in the good times, it also works against you in the bad times.

@iqpb - re: #6

Yeah, you can be one of the world's greatest engineers and you'll still get feedback you're not good enough. And you have minimal decision making authority - even the smallest changes go through an approval meeting - where you explain to managers who know much less than you what should be done. [Meanwhile, executives make mistakes that cost billions of dollars.]

We need someone like the OP to replace BK.. Fantastic read and spot on. Please keep it coming.

Can I sell this post? Could be worth a few million bucks..

Fantastic sumazation of Intel's past and current landscape. It also highlights some of the still looming challenges we face. Op, you should go ahead and take a stab at what type of strategy you would implement to combat some of the problems. These aren't easy problems to solve but your ideas are probably just as valid as the current leadership's ideas and strategies.

Excellent post!

#GOLD post

The problem with Intel

Client CPU under pressure

Steep drop in unit volume from the 2012 peak of 343M units to estimated 232M units this year (Gartner estimate)

Caused by lack of innovation and "good enough" computing

Here are a few wild ideas

1) How about the TD listen to the customers. Instead of meeting after meeting challenging your customers to what they need this versus that, listen to them, what a concept.

2) How about product teams figure out that doing the same old same old isn't going to cut it. The world doesn't care about just faster. You need to anticipate what your customers want and then deliver. Any bozo can draw a straight line to faster DDR, USB, more FPS, blah blah blah.

3) Sales/Marketing how about finding usage models to leverage compute power 1000X more than most people need to read post here, or watch video. Dang we don't need much more compute power we need new ways to use it

4) IoT, get real, that is an idea chasing a solution. It isn't about standards, its about finding something that we will buy. I don't need my washer to tell me on my cell phone the cloths are done. BTW if I do, I don't care if it is x86 or ARM, and I won't pay one $ more for that capability.

5) Memory, really, I won't pay more than 250 bucks for a TB of SSD at the most, most people expect a TB for less than 150 bucks, you can get a HDD for 90 bucks, you can make money there?

6) How about a culture of listening instead of telling your engineers how stupid they are, and to work faster, how about listening to their ideas and plans. Can the managers pull their faces out of their phones and laptops to listen, think and give real guidance.

BTW every Intel manager and engineer that is at the company needs to read this post, and everyone that is leaving or left can read it and feel good they got off the ship. It ain't looking pretty as Moore's Law has run off the cliff, who cares if your 10nm is better than most others 7nm? The issue is do you have products and value from that product and will it come out on time and be cost effective in a dog eat dog world. The x86 monopoly is going away, what will Intel do to survive?

I'll just leave this here:

https://news.samsung.com/global/samsung-mass-producing-industrys-first-512-gigabyte-nvme-ssd-in-a-single-bga-package-for-more-flexibility-in-computing-device-design

Thank you for such an articulate post. I'm still there and planning my exit. they no longer value status quo nay sayers (i am one). This company is not the same. Its so sad. the company has seen many talented people and they just beat them up anymore. seriously. my job should be automated. I tell my management and peers. they all look at me like i'm some kind of job killer. but if we can develop our way out hey we have new skills :-). and they will all be surprised when our jobs are cut but I will laugh as I cry. because my job should be automated.

OP here.

I forgot to mention the balance sheet and financials:

• $2.0B in long term debt in 2010

• $21.78B in the most recent quarter in 2016

• That's not a typo. That's over a 10x increase in debt to finance dividends, stock buybacks and the Altera acquisition

• Intel has changed their depreciation expense accounting to comprehend the slowdown in 10nm which positively affects their financials (saving $1.5B in depreciation charges)

• Intel overpaid for Altera at ~10x revenue. Next generation Stratix-10 has been delayed to mid-2017 (as per EETimes). Xilinx is taking lots of marketshare and just announced lackluster growth out to 2021 vs. expectations which means Altera will be worse.

Probably one of the best posts on here. Thanks for taking the time to write this up.

Completely agree. To Those who ask for a solution... What is the solution for winter? There is none. Things die and then in the spring others take their place. Such is the way of companies too. One one of the original Dow companies is still around. It is Intel's time to die. (that doesn't mean that all was in vain - Intel provided the world with great technology for a long period of time... but now that is coming to an end). Turn, turn, turn.

-fnv

This is hilarious. Intel thinks Taiwan is the innovation hub for IoT. Wrong - it's Shenzhen because of the smartphone manufacturing infrastructure that has been built over a decade.

Listen to the strategy, be scared very scared

http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20160530VL205.html

Wow!

The network is the computer.

The OP is my hero, this is all I wanted to say but could not articulate

Good post. Where is the solution to solve the problem?

Change and leadership start at the top. BK has to go. He hasn't demonstrated any ability to shift the culture.