Monday, December 2nd 2024
Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger Retires, Company Appoints two Interim co-CEOs
Intel Corporation (NASDAQ: INTC) today announced that CEO Pat Gelsinger retired from the company after a distinguished 40-plus-year career and has stepped down from the board of directors, effective Dec. 1, 2024. Intel has named two senior leaders, David Zinsner and Michelle (MJ) Johnston Holthaus, as interim co-chief executive officers while the board of directors conducts a search for a new CEO. Zinsner is executive vice president and chief financial officer, and Holthaus has been appointed to the newly created position of CEO of Intel Products, a group that encompasses the company's Client Computing Group (CCG), Data Center and AI Group (DCAI) and Network and Edge Group (NEX). Frank Yeary, independent chair of the board of Intel, will become interim executive chair during the period of transition. Intel Foundry leadership structure remains unchanged.
The board has formed a search committee and will work diligently and expeditiously to find a permanent successor to Gelsinger. Yeary said, "On behalf of the board, I want to thank Pat for his many years of service and dedication to Intel across a long career in technology leadership. Pat spent his formative years at Intel, then returned at a critical time for the company in 2021. As a leader, Pat helped launch and revitalize process manufacturing by investing in state-of-the-art semiconductor manufacturing, while working tirelessly to drive innovation throughout the company."
Yeary continued, "While we have made significant progress in regaining manufacturing competitiveness and building the capabilities to be a world-class foundry, we know that we have much more work to do at the company and are committed to restoring investor confidence. As a board, we know first and foremost that we must put our product group at the center of all we do. Our customers demand this from us, and we will deliver for them. With MJ's permanent elevation to CEO of Intel Products along with her interim co-CEO role of Intel, we are ensuring the product group will have the resources needed to deliver for our customers. Ultimately, returning to process leadership is central to product leadership, and we will remain focused on that mission while driving greater efficiency and improved profitability."
Yeary concluded, "With Dave and MJ's leadership, we will continue to act with urgency on our priorities: simplifying and strengthening our product portfolio and advancing our manufacturing and foundry capabilities while optimizing our operating expenses and capital. We are working to create a leaner, simpler, more agile Intel."
Gelsinger said, "Leading Intel has been the honor of my lifetime - this group of people is among the best and the brightest in the business, and I'm honored to call each and every one a colleague. Today is, of course, bittersweet as this company has been my life for the bulk of my working career. I can look back with pride at all that we have accomplished together. It has been a challenging year for all of us as we have made tough but necessary decisions to position Intel for the current market dynamics. I am forever grateful for the many colleagues around the world who I have worked with as part of the Intel family."
Throughout Gelsinger's tenure at Intel across a variety of roles, he has driven significant innovation and advanced not only the business but the broader global technology industry. A highly respected leader and skilled technologist, he has played an instrumental role in focusing on innovation while also creating a sense of urgency throughout the organization. Gelsinger began his career in 1979 at Intel, growing at the company to eventually become its first chief technology officer.
Zinsner and Holthaus said, "We are grateful for Pat's commitment to Intel over these many years as well as his leadership. We will redouble our commitment to Intel Products and meeting customer needs. With our product and process leadership progressing, we will be focused on driving returns on foundry investments."
Zinsner has more than 25 years of financial and operational experience in semiconductors, manufacturing and the technology industry. He joined Intel in January 2022 from Micron Technology Inc., where he was executive vice president and CFO. Zinsner served in a variety of other leadership roles earlier in his career, including president and chief operating officer at Affirmed Networks and senior vice president of finance and CFO at Analog Devices.
Holthaus is a proven general manager and leader who began her career with Intel nearly three decades ago. Prior to being named CEO of Intel Products, she was executive vice president and general manager of CCG. Holthaus has held a variety of management and leadership roles at Intel, including chief revenue officer and general manager of the Sales and Marketing Group, and lead of global CCG sales.
The board has formed a search committee and will work diligently and expeditiously to find a permanent successor to Gelsinger. Yeary said, "On behalf of the board, I want to thank Pat for his many years of service and dedication to Intel across a long career in technology leadership. Pat spent his formative years at Intel, then returned at a critical time for the company in 2021. As a leader, Pat helped launch and revitalize process manufacturing by investing in state-of-the-art semiconductor manufacturing, while working tirelessly to drive innovation throughout the company."
Yeary concluded, "With Dave and MJ's leadership, we will continue to act with urgency on our priorities: simplifying and strengthening our product portfolio and advancing our manufacturing and foundry capabilities while optimizing our operating expenses and capital. We are working to create a leaner, simpler, more agile Intel."
Gelsinger said, "Leading Intel has been the honor of my lifetime - this group of people is among the best and the brightest in the business, and I'm honored to call each and every one a colleague. Today is, of course, bittersweet as this company has been my life for the bulk of my working career. I can look back with pride at all that we have accomplished together. It has been a challenging year for all of us as we have made tough but necessary decisions to position Intel for the current market dynamics. I am forever grateful for the many colleagues around the world who I have worked with as part of the Intel family."
Throughout Gelsinger's tenure at Intel across a variety of roles, he has driven significant innovation and advanced not only the business but the broader global technology industry. A highly respected leader and skilled technologist, he has played an instrumental role in focusing on innovation while also creating a sense of urgency throughout the organization. Gelsinger began his career in 1979 at Intel, growing at the company to eventually become its first chief technology officer.
Zinsner and Holthaus said, "We are grateful for Pat's commitment to Intel over these many years as well as his leadership. We will redouble our commitment to Intel Products and meeting customer needs. With our product and process leadership progressing, we will be focused on driving returns on foundry investments."
Zinsner has more than 25 years of financial and operational experience in semiconductors, manufacturing and the technology industry. He joined Intel in January 2022 from Micron Technology Inc., where he was executive vice president and CFO. Zinsner served in a variety of other leadership roles earlier in his career, including president and chief operating officer at Affirmed Networks and senior vice president of finance and CFO at Analog Devices.
Holthaus is a proven general manager and leader who began her career with Intel nearly three decades ago. Prior to being named CEO of Intel Products, she was executive vice president and general manager of CCG. Holthaus has held a variety of management and leadership roles at Intel, including chief revenue officer and general manager of the Sales and Marketing Group, and lead of global CCG sales.
217 Comments on Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger Retires, Company Appoints two Interim co-CEOs
www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/intel-ceos-compensation-still-trails-amd-ceos-by-half-despite-a-significant-boost-in-2023
Intel is in need of a massive restructuring including more subsidiary sell offs and large layoffs to break and rebuild the corporate identity and focus (ala AMD). I don’t see any other way.
Moving the deck chairs around on the titanic just isn’t going to cut it. IMHO.
I think the real "behind the scenes" has to do with the future of Intel and not so much its present or past. The big theory floating around that 18A is a messed up process just makes a lot of sense. Intel's poured tens of $billions into 20A and 18A, and 20A is already a failure. Intel cannot tolerate further disruptions to its manufacturing plans.
I hope some manufacturers start making powerful consumer market Risc V soc's As arm and x86 is going to cost stupid much on the high end and stagnate like the gpu market on the lower to midrange.
Now I know what Pat meant when he said "Papa's home"...
All that said, yes this could be a sign of further bad news lol. I'm just saying we don't know yet.
I too have a relatively positive view of Pat. He got Intel through some very troubled times, I'd say Intel hasn't been stable ever since Brian Krzanich had to resign for doing an Intel Inside his secretary :laugh:
While Intel in the past boasted about having the best gaming CPUs, Gelsinger did not seem to care about this segment at all. Of course, they make a lot of other products than gaming CPUs, and in the grand scheme of things this market may not be that important for the company, but the total lack of interest is noticeable and it probably had no positive effect on anything.
BTW I think that delivering a bit underwhelming Arrow lake - a first product which is radically different than all previous monolithic CPUs is quite excusable, but Intel probably really needed to deliver some decisively good and compelling product.
The problem Gelsinger had is that it takes 5 years from start to silicon to make a new CPU. So whatever they were designing when he took the reigns, won't see the light of day until 2026-2027.
That said, Raptor Lake (enhanced Alder Lake, both versions) as well as Rocket Lake (Ice Lake 14nm) were created at Pat's behest. They weren't new but stopgaps to buy more time for their nodes to catch up. Intel's original roadmap should have had them on Alder Lake in 2019, not 2022.
IMO Lunar Lake is the first real sign that Intel was back on the path to dominance. Granite Rapids and Sierra Forest also signal that they caught up with AMD. Probably too little too late though, Arrow Lake is a flop and they are using too much TSMC to fab on their new chips. It's a very mixed bag.
Pat was given an ultimatum: either retire (with a semblance of honor) or be handed a box, told to clean out his desk, and unceremoniously shown the door. Pat chose the first option.
I doubt him leaving will bolster gaming or enthusiast segment because they could make 8 and 12 large core monolithic chips and be at the top of those segments but they won't because we are a niche market. And it's very telling when neither AMD or Intel have released monolithic versions for gaming in the interim as it's well known the latency caused with chiplets doesn't play nice with games and we could have still been using monolithic for that purpose.