The Dire State Of Intel...What Happened?

People say intel isn't innovative, but the truth is that they are capable of creating chips using the most cutting edge and advanced technologies of 2007

Marketing over engineering is also Boeing slogan

"When Apple was founded, we were 10 years ahead of the competition. What happened in 10 years? The competition caught up and Apple stood still. That is why Apple is failing." Steve Jobs, 1997

Whatever state Intel is in right now, they are definitely not going bankrupt.

They had "business" leaders instead of actual engineers and people who understand the industry. Unfortunately a problem with a lot of companies nowadays.

ASML is NOT a chip maker. They are a chip tool maker!

So basically, Intel pulled a Boeing.

Maybe if Intel wasn't giving us 4 core CPU's for 10 years straight they wouldn't get caught with their pants down when Zen came out? 😂😂😂

Intel fell behind because of one primary reason: They bet against ASML's EUV technology when it was first introduced. Intel believed that EUV systems are extremely complicated and expensive (which they are right about), but they also thought the yield on EUV systems would be too low for it to be worth investing in (They are wrong about this one however). Intel instead spent massive dollars on different patterning techniques such as multiple lithography to squeeze out smaller feature sizes in nanoelectronics with legacy DUV lithography systems. Eventual TSMC, and Samsung caught up as they were the first adopters of EUV technology. Intel actually has spent much more money in R&D than any semiconductor industry company including Nvidia, TSMC, AMD, Samsung, etc. Intel actually spends more than Nvidia, AMD, and TSMC combined, but they are constantly researching crazy technologies that do not pan out well like Intel Optane. They also were stubborn and continued to manufacture older 14 nm process ICs using their own foundries instead of using TSMC. Intel Chip designs are arguable much more innovative than AMD's, but they are stuck on an older process node. Only recently has Intel begun to use TSMC under Pat Gelsinger. Intel is on a come back. They will be the first to utilize ASML's new High NA EUV machines in their upcoming 20A, and 18A process nodes in late 2024. In addition, they will be introducing back power routing in those same nodes - something TSMC does not plan to introduce until 2026. These two technologies are gambles much like TSMC, and Samsung gambled in adopting EUV, but it could pan out well for Intel.

I used to work as a Compiler Engineer in Intel for 3 years, and I was laid off last year, along with a bunch of other people. I can say that it was good while it lasted. I don't know anything about financial concerns, I just think that Intel is a decent place for employees to work.

The biggest mistake of Intel, by far, was it's failure to recognize the potential in smartphone SOC in the mid 2000. Apple was turned down by Intel, wich led the start of the development of their own SOC, wich became the foundation of the M cpu of today. This decision alone open the door for the ARM SOC era of today instead of X86 SOC in smartphone, to wich i'm pretty happy.

I guess that's what 7 years of Sky Lake did to Intel. Just imagine - they were making CPUs with the same archtecture for 7 years straight and only increased frequency of their chips. Moreover, they could not move from 14 nm to 10 nm in 6 years until they made very questionable Ice Lake low power mobile chips. Bob Swan was a wrong CEO to choose, for sure.

Technically, neither NVIDIA nor AMD are chipmakers. AMD chips are made by TSMC while NVIDIA chips are made my TSMC or Samsung. Intel make their own chips and can also make them for other companies. And given the geopolitical risks associated with Taiwan and potentially South Korea as well, Intel is basically the only advanced chip manufacturer in the "safe" parts of the world.

Intels biggest problem wasn't the CEO it was Murthy Renduchintala who Krzanich poached from Qualcomm in 2015 with the express purpose of upgrading Intels design efforts and foundries. Pre 2011 Intel typically had 2 chips on each node before switching to the next, these changes happened every 2 years roughly. e.g. 32nm in 2009 for Westmere & Sandybridge, whilst AMD was still using 45nm. 22nm in 2011 for Ivybridge and Haswell, whilst AMD was now on 32nm. This was when the complacency started 3 years on a single node. AMD was on it's knees with sheare prices hovering between $2-5 per share and hitting an all time low of $1.81 by 2014. Intel was on 14nm in 2014 whilst AMD was now using 28nm, this was the start of the rot in their foundries, instead of just 2 CPU's per node we got this lot. Broadwell, Skylake, Kaby Lake, Coffee Lake, Cascade Lake, Comet Lake, 6 CPU models on a single node in 5 years, 2 years into this timeline they dropped their "Tick Tock" path of advancement, new architecture 1st year with a refinement the next (hence the 2 CPU lines per process node. we all remember the 14nm++++++++++ memes don't we? With 5-10% generational performance increases along with prices going through the roof. This really only happened as Intel took 5 years to get their 10nm node to produce high enough yields to be profitable, this is where Murthy comes into play.. He constantly was telling Krzanich "10nm is coming along just fine" whilst hiding the outrageously poor yields and even worse performance of the entire node. Then we get to 2016.. Intel launches the 6900K 8 core 16 thread CPU STILL on 14nm launched for $1089US, followed less than a year later by Zen 1, Both on 14nm but intel were on their own foundries whilst AMD were using Global Foundries or TSMC Intel had squandered their process node lead thanks to the 10nm delays and so, Zen arrived @$499 and beat Intel in non gaming benchmarks at less than half the price, yeah Intel still lead by a large margin in gaming in AOTS but a mere 3-20% in fps terms? For double the cost but no where near double the gaming performance? Intel compounded the issue by then launching the 10 core 20 thread 7900X still at a whopping $999US and AMD released the 2700X @ just $329US. Intel were relying on customer awareness to inflate costs (Not to mention dirty tactics in their past like forcing OEM's to not advertise AMD CPU's or risk losing access to Intel CPU's despite those AMD CPU's actually performing better).. As AMD closed the gap Intel stood still until Murthy was ousted in favour of Bob Swan, Intel wasn't helped by Murthy encouraging inter departmental infighting, Bob Swan ended this by basically telling dept head to stop pissing in other departments ponds or face the axe. Swan wasn't an engineer but he DID solve the internal strife at Intel before Gelsinger took over in 2021. Intel is STILL paying the price of Murthy's game playing, this is made worse by the current Intel fiasco over what is Intel "in spec" which is now seeing Intel HAVE to push out much lower wattage BIOS versions due to poor stability because they're THAT desperate for the win they'll do practically anything until they get found out... AMD have constantly innovated since Jim Keller rejoined them in 2012 to design Zen the infamously "glued together chips" which Intel derided so vociferously then desperately followed suit??? AMD also adopted Intel's previous tick tock regimen with 2 entire teams leapfrogging for each new major architecture, a policy reintroduced at Intel in 2021-22 after being abandoned in 2016 right in the midst of the 10nm debacle. Intel only has themselves to blame for their complacency arrogance and short-sightedness right when AMD were upping their game. Put it this way... In 2015 AMD's shares were at an all time low of just $1.82 whilst Intel were at $34.94, how are things now? Intel @ $30.51 down from a high of $68.26 over the last 3 years, whilst AMD? $150.56 and an absolute high of $227.3 in March this year. I gets worse when yo look at it this way... Intel's lead has fallen from 15 times the price per share in Q3 2015 and swung completely in the opposite to now being worth just 20% of AMD's current share prices.... This'll only become worse due to these new to the public stability issues which remained hidden for several years, iirc 11th 12th 13th and 14th gen are ALL affected and I wouldn't be too surprised to hear 10th gen are in there as well so that's 4-5 years of CPU's with instabilities cause by Intel chasing the gaming crown by pushing excessive watts and amps through their CPU's.

AMD's Ryzen lineup were such a breath of fresh air to the industry.

What happened to Intel is they pulled a Netburst, when they found their chips couldn't cut the mustard instead of going back to the drawing board they simply started cranking the voltage to get higher and higher clocks. It is exactly what they did with Prescott P4s when they found the Athlon was beating them on performance and ended up creating space heaters that still wasn't as good as the AMD offering only this time they have cranked the voltages so high the silicon itself is degrading.

In the 90s ppl use to ask "What computer do you have? Pentium 1, 2 or 3?"

Google is on a similar path. 😢

The only reason amd came back was because they found loophole to get out of their contract with globalfoundries (thats why their chips sucked) and was able to make chips with tsmc.

They're a military contractor, the Pentagon won't allow them to disappear.