Tuesday, October 19th 2021
Intel's CEO Blames Predecessors for Current State of the Company, Wants Apple Business Back with Better Processors
It's funny how new company CEOs always seem to blame their predecessors for whatever went wrong and it seems like Pat Gelsinger is no different, as he's throwing shade at his predecessors for not having been engineers. At the same time, he's set his mind on winning Apple back as a customer, as all Intel apparently has to do "is create a better chip than they can do themselves", with they being Apple here.
It should be pointed out that Intel hasn't had an engineer at the helm of the company since 2005, so the question is how far back Pat Gelsinger wants to throw the blame, although a guesstimate would be back to at least 2012/2013 when Paul Otellini stepped down. That said, in an interview with Axios, it's stated that "while he acknowledges the need to prove himself, Gelsinger said he will rebuild the company's credibility with its customers so that if they say they need a million of some chip by Monday, the order will be there by Sunday night."
That's a lofty goal during the current circumstances, although it seems like he has an ever bigger goal in mind and that is to get Intel back in with Apple, although technically the company isn't "out" as yet, since the Mac Pro and the 27-inch iMac are still Intel based. Gelsinger said Apple "did a pretty good job" with its new SoCs, although this was before the M1 Pro and M1 Max were announced, so it would be interesting to hear what he thinks about the new chips. It's hard to see Apple going back to Intel, especially in the mobile space, unless Intel can somehow beat Apple's own processors when it comes to both performance and power efficiency.
For those of us that have been around for a while and that have followed Intel, it's hard to see how Intel is going to deliver a competitive product, since the company is infamous for its comparatively poor power efficiency compared to Arm based SoCs and there's a reason why Intel no longer is competing in the smartphone market space. So what does Gelsinger plan to do in the meantime? Well, it looks like he's going to be busy making sure Intel makes better and more appealing products. You can watch part of the interview below.
Sources:
Axios, Axios
It should be pointed out that Intel hasn't had an engineer at the helm of the company since 2005, so the question is how far back Pat Gelsinger wants to throw the blame, although a guesstimate would be back to at least 2012/2013 when Paul Otellini stepped down. That said, in an interview with Axios, it's stated that "while he acknowledges the need to prove himself, Gelsinger said he will rebuild the company's credibility with its customers so that if they say they need a million of some chip by Monday, the order will be there by Sunday night."
For those of us that have been around for a while and that have followed Intel, it's hard to see how Intel is going to deliver a competitive product, since the company is infamous for its comparatively poor power efficiency compared to Arm based SoCs and there's a reason why Intel no longer is competing in the smartphone market space. So what does Gelsinger plan to do in the meantime? Well, it looks like he's going to be busy making sure Intel makes better and more appealing products. You can watch part of the interview below.
74 Comments on Intel's CEO Blames Predecessors for Current State of the Company, Wants Apple Business Back with Better Processors
What's the point in blaming other people for things that you had no control over when they've already left the company? In this case it seems like some of them left a long time ago.
Have you heard of any attempts to bring back IDF to life? He is the de facto founder of IDF. I'd love to see it rebooted.
:)
That's bs, sorry. Lack of accountability to employees and customers is what got the PC industry in the miserly state it now is.
And really? It's *not* the Wild West?!
You forget that "in the old days" CEOs were a tame bunch. They were real innovators but their demeanour looks dated to us now. Now compare that to the tech 'mavericks' we see now what with their God complexes and huge effing egos.
Gelsinger, who was probably the last CTO of Intel's to do something reasonable (dropping Pentium 4, moving to the Core architecture much thanks to Dadi Perlmutter and the Haifa labs), is just joining the bandwagon of attention-seeking CEO whores we see in tech nowadays.
It's really much worse now than it ever was, CEO-wise.
- Companies and their product marketing are floating products in slideware and making paper launches left right and centre.
- Leaks happen daily.
- Corporate PR people are subservient to the "tabloid youtubers" (I make an exception of the Steves - GN/HU, Igor's Lab and Der8auer).
- Games are P2W. Also, you hardly own them, these days.
- One company controls almost 50% of all semiconductor production. That company hiccups, and it's chaos through and through.
- Component prices have sky rocketed in just about every component of the PC business (despite some news we might get a bit of respite from DRAM, but then again that's a predictable cycle when transitioning from one DRAM tech to another, DDR4 prices will skyrocket too as soon as production shifts and stocked-up inventory is spent).
- Reputable brands are using lower grade (cheaper) components, just to boost the bottom line, with no real consequence: "It's still good enough" says the consumer (vide: SSDs, PSUs and HDDs)
- Miners are soaking up GPU inventory like a mofo, and oddly enough, the only country to take action against them is ... CHINA?! WTF?
We can also look at the broader tech landscape:- Bitcoin. Bitcoin isn't a disruptive technology. If Bitcoin pays off (literally) it'll put way more money into the billionaire investors' pocket than it will into the average joes'. Do we want to talk about the climate cost?
- Starlink. Biggest joke on (off) Earth! The promise of delivering broadband to far-away places is really laughable - unless you want broadband in Siberia, not to mention the cancer of space debris and visual pollution that astronomers have to put up with.
- Electric vehicles whose carbon footprint far exceeds gas/petrol and diesel vehicles.
Are you comparing this to "back when a basic IBM PC cost upwards of $3000" but gave businesses a competitive edge that was quantifiable, and therefore justified the investment?Is a poor situation in a country that country president's fault? You don't blame one person for a failure because it is not just that person contributing to that failure. There are board of members also which have more to say than a CEO. In an organization there is always someone above you. Always. CEO is the face of the company but board members are the ruling organ.
So, blaming a CEO for all bad that happened and a failure of the company is like blaming a president of a country for the failure despite the decision was not his but the government and parties voting. Pat's unprofessional behavior scolding previous CEO and blaming them shows incompetence and a lack of understanding or simply ignorance.
As for accountability: In countries where "Presidents" have real power like the USA, they are hands-on with the decision-making. The responsibility is - ultimately - theirs. Not one president, but multiple predecessors. We can disagree on this, I don't mind. Likewise, I think the CEO has a bunch of advisors, but they are the ultimate decision-makers, and the person responsible for the company performance. Of course there are market factors at play (e.g. supply chain issues, like we're experiencing now), but that explains the last year or so (and is impacting the entire industry). No-one goes around saying
BTW: do you think he is wrong? Poor decision-making and no accountability from Intel CEOs for the company's performance in the past 20 years? It still makes money, but it's been on the path to decline for a while. I honestly think Alder Lake-S is the biggest news coming out of Intel for the past... 10 years? But I also think it's a bit smoke and mirrors, as sustained high-performance on these CPUs (like the 12900K) will likely push the CPU TDP close to 300W, and will rely on a mix of quality electrical components on the mobo, quality of the PSU and overall cooling.
Just to prove the point that he's basically selling an idea (that Intel is on a new course), he also makes a silly boast that they want Apple's business back. That's not just unlikely, but would actually put into question Apple's own R&D investments since it acquired PA Semi back in 2008. Apple has made solid progress on its ARM silicon since it's A4 SoC, and would be stupid to about-face on their switch to M1 right now or even in the next 10 years.
It does not matter.I think he is telling what the audience wants to hear. More like give hope New sheriff in town like you said. Approach which is basically false. He is not deciding about anything he is merely an executive officer who will implement the ideas which may (probably wont be) not be his.
As I see it, The CEO is responsible but board is accountable. Responsibility to implement agreed views and approach for the company. How's that gonna work and what profits it will bring that's a different story and board is accountable for that.
The approach has to change but I doubt he can pull this off. What he is selling is a promise and the bragging to what is coming. We all know it may fail and I would rather refrain from statements that competition is going down, Intel is back etc. Not sure if that is a guarantee of changed approach cause in my eyes it looks exactly the same.Each CEO had the same thing to say. New approach but it does not mean it will be better. So bragging about something, like a vision of future, is a bad approach in my eyes.
I'm not saying he can't change something, I'm saying nothing has been done so far and he is already celebrating a success.
I'm just annoyed on how a wipo patent does cost 10k or over
though I wonder how do some companies file thousands of patents(often stupid things too), do they print money?
Some companies might tell you that they don't get to patent everything they want to patent lol
Most of the ones I've seen meet once a quarter for a few days <- that simple fact should explain quite a bit to you. Perhaps you should go look at Intel's BoD, Gelsinger is a giant amongst that pack. Most of them haven't been there more than 5 years. Their main function has to do with picking the leadership of the company and determining their compensation. Strategy is usually something they get from prospective CEOs, not make up themselves.