Intel Corporation today reported third-quarter 2024 financial results.

"Our Q3 results underscore the solid progress we are making against the plan we outlined last quarter to reduce costs, simplify our portfolio and improve organizational efficiency. We delivered revenue above the midpoint of our guidance, and are acting with urgency to position the business for sustainable value creation moving forward," said Pat Gelsinger, Intel CEO. "The momentum we are building across our product portfolio to maximize the value of our x86 franchise, combined with the strong interest Intel 18A is attracting from foundry customers, reflects the impact of our actions and the opportunities ahead."

Last time we reported on Samsung Foundry, the company publicly apologized for its setbacks in the memory and foundry divisions, especially as its 3 nm GAA FET node has failed to attract new customers. On the other hand, Intel has also been struggling with its Foundry unit bleeding billions of Dollars in a bid to secure its spot as one of the best foundries for companies to manufacture their chips. There is no better pair than two struggling foundries looking for customers and new ways to conduct research than Intel and Samsung. According to an exclusive by South Korean media outlet "MK," it has reportedly been confirmed that Intel approached Samsung to form a "Foundry Alliance" to boost their foundry business units.

According to the source, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger is reportedly eager to meet with Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Jae-yong face-to-face to discuss "comprehensive collaboration in the foundry sector." What exactly will happen between the two is still unclear. Back in 2014, GlobalFoundries and Samsung formed a partnership for 14 nm FinFET offerings, and that was a wide success. Jointly developing a node and offering it in their foundry units could be the target goal for Intel and Samsung. At some level, research and development, as well as sharing valuable manufacturing information on yield improvements, should be beneficial for both to put together the final pieces of the semiconductor puzzle.

Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger was a special guest at Lenovo Tech World 2024, the computing giant's annual showcase of its latest innovations. The opening keynote address saw Gelsinger make a special appearance to greet Lenovo CEO Yang Yuanqing, but he wasn't alone. In his pocket was a next-generation "Panther Lake" processor. This chip appears to be an H-segment package for mainstream notebooks, which makes the chip a direct successor to the "Arrow Lake-H" mobile processor that comes out in Q1-2025.

According to leaks from reliable sources, "Panther Lake-H" is said to come in CPU core-counts of up to 18. That's 6P+8E+4LP. It sees the reintroduction of low-power island E-cores located in the SoC tile. The six P-cores are "Cougar Cove," which could feature a generational IPC uplift over the current "Lion Cove," while the current "Skymont" E-cores are carried forward into "Panther Lake." The SoC tile could see an upgrade to a newer foundry node from its current 6 nm on "Arrow Lake," to accommodate the low-power island E-cores, and possibly a faster NPU. The iGPU of "Panther Lake" is allegedly based on the next-generation Xe3 "Celestial" graphics architecture. This faster iGPU, along with a faster NPU, low-power island E-cores, and slightly faster P-cores, could be what "Panther Lake-H" brings to the table. Given that "Arrow Lake-H" sees an early-2025 introduction, we don't expect "Panther Lake-H" out till at least 2026.

Intel Corp. (INTC) and AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) today announced the creation of an x86 ecosystem advisory group bringing together technology leaders to shape the future of the world's most widely used computing architecture. x86 is uniquely positioned to meet customers' emerging needs by delivering superior performance and seamless interoperability across hardware and software platforms. The group will focus on identifying new ways to expand the x86 ecosystem by enabling compatibility across platforms, simplifying software development, and providing developers with a platform to identify architectural needs and features to create innovative and scalable solutions for the future.

For over four decades, x86 has served as the bedrock of modern computing, establishing itself as the preferred architecture in data centers and PCs worldwide. In today's evolving landscape - characterized by dynamic AI workloads, custom chiplets, and advancements in 3D packaging and system architectures - the importance of a robust and expanding x86 ecosystem is more crucial than ever.

All eyes have been on Intel since we announced Q2 earnings. There has been no shortage of rumors and speculation about the company, including last week's Board of Directors meeting, so I'm writing today to provide some updates and outline what comes next. Let me start by saying we had a highly productive and supportive Board meeting. We have a strong Board comprised of independent directors whose job it is to challenge and push us to perform at our best. And we had deep discussions about our strategy, our portfolio and the immediate progress we are making against the plan we announced on August 1.

The Board and I agreed that we have a lot of work ahead to drive greater efficiency, improve our profitability and enhance our market competitiveness—and there are three key takeaways from last week's meeting that I want to focus on:

• We must build on our momentum in Foundry as we near the launch of Intel 18A and drive greater capital efficiency across this part of our business.
• We must continue acting with urgency to create a more competitive cost structure and deliver the $10B in savings target we announced last month.
• We must refocus on our strong x86 franchise as we drive our AI strategy while streamlining our product portfolio in service to Intel customers and partners.

We have several pieces of news to share that support these priorities.

According to a recent Reuters report, Intel's 18A node doesn't seem to be production-ready. As the sources indicate, Broadcom has been reportedly testing Intel's 18A node on its internal company designs, which include an extensive range of products from AI accelerators to networking switches. However, as Broadcom received the initial production run from Intel, the 18A node seems to be in a worse state than initially expected. After testing the wafers and powering them on, Broadcom reportedly concluded that the 18A process is not yet ready for high-volume production. With Broadcom's comments reflecting high-volume production, it signals that the 18A node is not producing a decent yield that would satisfy external customers.

While this is not a good sign of Intel's Fundry contract business development, it shows that the node is presumably in a good state in terms of power/performance. Intel's CEO Pat Gelsinger confirmed that 18A is now at 0.4 d0 defect density, and it is now a "healthy process." However, alternatives exist at TSMC, which proves to be a very challenging competitor to take on, as its N7 and N5 nodes had a defect density of 0.33 during development and 0.1 defect density during high-volume production. This leads to better yields and lower costs for the contracting party, resulting in higher profits. Ultimately, it is up to Intel to improve its production process further to satisfy customers. Gelsinger wants to see Intel Foundry as "manufacturing ready" by the end of the year, and we can see the first designs in 2025 reach volume production. There are still a few more months to improve the node, and we expect to see changes implemented by the end of the year.

Intel is reportedly exploring the sale of its Altera business, a move guided by CEO Pat Gelsinger as part of broader restructuring efforts. Acquired by Intel in 2015 for $16.7 billion, Altera, formerly known as the Programmable Solutions Group, has been a profitable segment. However, with Intel facing financial strain due to extensive spending, the company is now considering divesting its FPGA business to recoup capital. Currently, Altera operates as a separate entity within Intel, relying on the tech giant for R&D, sales, marketing, and support. Gelsinger is expected to propose the sale at a board meeting scheduled for mid-September, where he will outline his vision for Intel's future. This restructuring could also affect other parts of Intel's operations, including its Foundry business.

While previous reports suggested that Intel might spin off its Foundry unit or sell it to industry leaders like TSMC or Samsung, the latest information indicates that Intel plans to retain this division, albeit with scaled-back expansion efforts. The $32 billion factory in Germany, for example, may be scrapped, along with other capital-intensive projects, and other capital expansions may also be put on hold. Pat Gelsinger's vision still needs to be finalized and is still in the drafting phase, so until the mid-September board meeting, we have to wait to gain more information.

According to a recent report from Bloomberg, Intel is in talks with investment banks about a possible spin-out of its foundry business, as well as scraping some existing expansion plans to cut losses. As the report highlights, sources close to Intel noted that the company is exploring various ways to deal with the recent Q2 2024 earnings report. While Intel's revenues are in decline, they are still high. However, the profitability of running its business has declined so much that the company is now operating on a net loss, with an astonishing $1.61 billion in the red. CEO Pat Gelsinger is now exploring various ways to control these losses and make the 56-year-old giant profitable again. Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley are reportedly advising Intel about its future moves regarding the foundry business and overall operations.

The Intel Foundry unit represents the biggest consumer of the company's funds, as the expansion plans across the US and Europe are costing Intel billions of US Dollars. Even though the company receives various state subsidies to build semiconductor manufacturing facilities, it still has to put much of its capital to work. Given that the company is running tight on funds, some of these expansion plans that are not business-critical may get scraped. Additionally, running the foundry business is also turning out to be rather costly, with Q2 2024 recording a negative 65.5% operating margin. Separating Intel Product and Intel Foundry may be an option, or even selling the foundry business as a whole is on the table. Whatever happens next is yet to be cleared up. During the Deutsche Bank Technology Conference on Thursday, Pat Gelsinger also noted that "It's been a difficult few weeks" for Intel, with many employees getting laid off to try to establish new cost-saving measures.

According to a recent report from Reuters, tech giant Intel is facing a significant legal challenge as shareholders file a lawsuit following a dramatic plunge in the company's stock price. The legal action comes from Intel's recent announcement of dividend suspensions and plans to lay off over 15,000 employees. The semiconductor behemoth saw its market value plummet by a staggering $32 billion in a single day, leaving investors reeling. The Construction Laborers Pension Trust of Greater St. Louis has initiated a proposed class action suit, naming Intel, CEO Pat Gelsinger, and CFO David Zinsner as defendants. The plaintiffs allege that the company made misleading statements about its business operations and manufacturing capabilities, artificially inflating its stock price between January 25 and August 1.

Intel's financial woes stem from underperforming contract foundry operations and 1% drop in revenue during the second quarter of 2024. While it may seem miniscule, declining revenue is paired with a negative 15.3% operating margin, resulting in a net loss of $1.61 billion. The company's August 1 announcement caught many shareholders off guard, prompting accusations of inadequate disclosure and transparency. This lawsuit is just one of several legal battles Intel is currently strangled in. The company is also locked in a patent dispute with R2 Semiconductor across multiple European countries, centering on voltage regulation technology. While Intel has secured a victory in the UK, it faces ongoing litigation in Germany, France, and Italy. Adding to Intel's troubles, a separate class action lawsuit is being explored on behalf of customers who purchased potentially faulty 13th and 14th-generation processors. The company also canceled its September 2024 Innovation event, citing poor financials, without any words on Arrow Lake or Lunar Lake. While the cancelation of events is sad, it is necessary to get financials back on track, and product launches should continue as usual.

In a conversation with Intel's CEO Pat Gelsinger, industry analyst Patrick Moorhead revealed that Intel's Meteor Lake CPU platform suffers from some production issues. More specifically, Intel has been facing some yield and/or back-end production issues with its Meteor Lake platform, resulting in a negative impact on Intel's margins when producing the chip. The market is showing great demand for these chips, and Intel has been forced to run productions of "hot lots"-- batch production of silicon with the highest priority that gets moved to the front of the production line so they can get packaged as fast as possible. While this is a good sign that the demand is there, running hot lots increases production costs overall as some other wafers have to go back so Meteor Lake can pass.

The yield issues associated with Meteor Lake could be stemming from the only tile made by Intel in the MTL package: the compute tile made on the Intel 4 process. Intel 4 process is specific to Meteor Lake. No other Intel product uses it, not even the Xeon 6, which uses Intel 3, or any of the upcoming CPUs like Arrow Lake, which uses the Intel 20A node. So, Intel is doing multiple nodes for multiple generations of processors, further driving up costs as typical high-volume production with a single node for multiple processors yields lower costs. Additionally, the company is left with lots of "wafers to burn" with Intel 4 node, so even with Meteor Lake having yield issues, the production is ultimately fine, while the operating costs and margins take a hit.

Intel Corporation today reported second-quarter 2024 financial results. "Our Q2 financial performance was disappointing, even as we hit key product and process technology milestones. Second-half trends are more challenging than we previously expected, and we are leveraging our new operating model to take decisive actions that will improve operating and capital efficiencies while accelerating our IDM 2.0 transformation," said Pat Gelsinger, Intel CEO. "These actions, combined with the launch of Intel 18A next year to regain process technology leadership, will strengthen our position in the market, improve our profitability and create shareholder value."

"Second-quarter results were impacted by gross margin headwinds from the accelerated ramp of our AI PC product, higher than typical charges related to non-core businesses and the impact from unused capacity," said David Zinsner, Intel CFO. "By implementing our spending reductions, we are taking proactive steps to improve our profits and strengthen our balance sheet. We expect these actions to meaningfully improve liquidity and reduce our debt balance while enabling us to make the right investments to drive long-term value for shareholders."

According to sources close to Bloomberg, Intel plans to cut 10,000 jobs from its global workforce. The news comes amid heavy pressure on the semiconductor giant, which has been on a steady decline over the years, while other industry rivals like AMD and NVIDIA have been rising and taking market share in various areas from Intel. It is reported that Intel currently has 110,000 employees globally, and reducing the workforce by 10,000 would net Intel around 100,000 global employees left. These figures exclude employees from spun-out units like Altera FPGA company, which is under Intel's ownership. Intel's aim to reduce its workforce is expected to come with a significant cost benefit to the company, with projected savings of $10 billion by 2025.

The news isn't yet official, but it is expected to see the light of the day as soon as this week. As Intel's CEO Pat Gelsinger invests heavily into the fab construction and development of next-generation products, there have been a few notes that Intel would have to overcome some challenges shortly to reach its long-term goals like more advanced silicon manufacturing facilities and new products for AI/HPC and client sector. One of those short-term measures is reducing the workforce to cut down expenses. Intel has reduced its workforce before. In 2022, the company announced reduced spending in non-critical areas and reducing the workforce, and in 2023, cut the workforce by 5% to 124,800 employees last year, only to be left with 110,000 employees in 2024.

We are live from the Intel Computex 2024 Keynote address in Taipei. CEO Pat Gelsinger, along with the heads of the company's various business groups will take stage to unveil the latest in PC processors, server processors, generative AI accelerators, datacenter infrastructure gear, and lots more! In particular, we're interested in their Core Ultra "Lunar Lake" and "Arrow Lake" processors, and next-generation Xeon 6 chips. Can Gaudi 3 break into the duopoly between NVIDIA and AMD? Join us to find out in this live-blog!02:55 UTC: Something really cool from the show: The camera is pointing at Intel's industry partners in the audience, and a Gaudi 3 is turning them into superhero images!03:02 UTC: Pat Gelsinger takes center stage.

Intel's CEO, Pat Gelsinger, has confirmed that the upcoming 18A process of the Panther Lake CPU generation is on schedule for a mid-2025 release, which aligns with the initial projection. This development marks a significant milestone in the company's ongoing efforts to integrate AI capabilities into its processors. The mid-2025 release date is expected to follow the debut of Intel's Arrow Lake process in late 2024 or early 2025, a release that holds the promise of significant advancements in AI computing. During Intel's Q1 2024 Quarterly Results, Gelsinger expressed confidence in the company's AI capabilities, stating that the Core Ultra platform currently delivers leadership AI performance and that the next-generation platforms, Lunar Lake and Arrow Lake, will launch later this year, tripling AI performance. He also mentioned that the Panther Lake generation, set to release in 2025, will grow AI performance up to an additional 2x.

The Panther Lake generation represents the culmination of three generations of work in a short time and is expected to continue Intel's iterative approach. This transition is marked by a shift from a hybrid architecture, a combination of different types of processors, to a disaggregated die, where different components of the processor are separated, as AI computing becomes increasingly prominent. This strategic move is aimed at optimizing AI performance and flexibility. This marks the third generation of the Intel Core Ultra series, following Ultra 100 (Meteor Lake), Ultra 200 (Arrow Lake), and Lunar Lake (200V). Intel's release strategy mirrors the pattern set by the Hybrid Architecture, with Alder Lake debuting in 2021, followed by Raptor Lake in 2022, and a refreshed Raptor Lake released last year to bridge the gap until LGA 1851 was ready. However, Intel's roadmap has seen adjustments in the past, such as the initial promise of an Arrow Lake release before the end of 2024, which was later retracted. The mid-2025 release of Panther Lake aligns with rumors of Arrow Lake's late 2024 or early 2025 debut, suggesting that the 18A process CPU generation could debut several months after Arrow Lake.

At the Intel Vision 2024 customer and partner conference, Intel introduced the Intel Gaudi 3 accelerator to bring performance, openness and choice to enterprise generative AI (GenAI), and unveiled a suite of new open scalable systems, next-gen products and strategic collaborations to accelerate GenAI adoption. With only 10% of enterprises successfully moving GenAI projects into production last year, Intel's latest offerings address the challenges businesses face in scaling AI initiatives.

"Innovation is advancing at an unprecedented pace, all enabled by silicon - and every company is quickly becoming an AI company," said Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger. "Intel is bringing AI everywhere across the enterprise, from the PC to the data center to the edge. Our latest Gaudi, Xeon and Core Ultra platforms are delivering a cohesive set of flexible solutions tailored to meet the changing needs of our customers and partners and capitalize on the immense opportunities ahead."

Intel Corporation today outlined a new financial reporting structure that is aligned with the company's previously announced foundry operating model for 2024 and beyond. This new structure is designed to drive increased cost discipline and higher returns by providing greater transparency, accountability and incentives across the business. To support the new structure, Intel provided recast operating segment financial results for the years 2023, 2022 and 2021. The company also shared a targeted path toward long-term growth and profitability of Intel Foundry, as well as clear goals for driving financial performance improvement and shareholder value creation.

"Intel's differentiated position as both a world-class semiconductor manufacturer and a fabless technology leader creates significant opportunities to drive long-term sustainable growth across these two complementary businesses," said Pat Gelsinger, Intel CEO. "Implementing this new model marks a key achievement in our IDM 2.0 transformation as we hone our execution engine, stand up the industry's first and only systems foundry with geographically diverse leading-edge manufacturing capacity, and advance our mission to bring AI Everywhere."

Intel is revamping its foundry play, and the company is set on its goals of becoming a strong contender to rivals such as TSMC and Samsung. Under Pat Gelsinger's lead, Intel recently split (virtually, under the same company) its units into Intel Product and Intel Foundry. During the SPIE 2024 conference for optics and photonics, Anne Kelleher, Intel's senior vice president, revealed that the 14A (1.4 nm) process offers a 15% performance-per-watt improvement over the company's 18A (1.8 nanometers) process. Additionally, the enhanced 14A-E process boasts a further 5% performance boost from the regular A14 node, being a small refresh. Intel's 14A process is set to be the first to utilize High-NA extreme ultraviolet (EUV) equipment, delivering a 20% increase in transistor logic density compared to the 18A node.

The company's aggressive pursuit of next-generation processes poses a significant threat to Samsung Electronics, which currently holds the second position in the foundry market. As part of its IDM 2.0 strategy, Intel hopes to reclaim its position as a leading foundry player and surpass Samsung by 2030. The company's collaboration with American companies, such as Microsoft, further solidifies its ambitions. Intel has already secured a $15 billion chip production contract with Microsoft for its 1.8 nm 18A process. The semiconductor industry is closely monitoring Intel's progress, as the company's advancements in process technology could potentially reshape the competitive landscape. With Samsung planning to mass-produce 2 nm process products next year, the race for dominance in the foundry market is heating up.

TAITRA (Taiwan External Trade Development Council) has announced Pat Gelsinger, CEO of Intel Corporation, as a keynote speaker at COMPUTEX 2024 on June 4. Embracing COMPUTEX's theme of artificial intelligence (AI), Gelsinger will showcase Intel's next-generation data center and client computing products bringing AI Everywhere by making the technology accessible through exceptionally engineered platforms, secure solutions and open ecosystems support.

Gelsinger will detail how Intel's AI portfolio - including AI-accelerated Intel Xeon, Intel Gaudi and Intel Core Ultra processor families - unlocks new possibilities in the data center and cloud and across the world's network and edge applications, and how it ushers in the age of the AI PC, transforming the future of productivity and creativity. Gelsinger will also discuss how Intel Xeon processors deliver exceptional performance-per-watt efficiencies, freeing up server capacity for more AI tasks while delivering optimal total cost of ownership (TCO) and power-saving sustainability benefits.

Intel has been hyping up their artificial intelligence-augmented processor products since late last year—their "AI Everywhere" marketing push started with the official launch of Intel Core Ultra mobile CPUs, AKA the much-delayed Meteor Lake processor family. CEO, Pat Gelsinger stated (mid-December 2023): "AI innovation is poised to raise the digital economy's impact up to as much as one-third of global gross domestic product...Intel is developing the technologies and solutions that empower customers to seamlessly integrate and effectively run AI in all their applications—in the cloud and, increasingly, locally at the PC and edge, where data is generated and used." Team Blue's presence at this week's MWC Barcelona 2024 event introduced "AI Everywhere Across Network, Edge, Enterprise."

Nikkei Asia sat down with Intel's David Feng—Vice President of Client Computing Group and General Manager of Client Segments. The impressively job-titled executive discussed the "future of AI PCs," and set some lofty sales goals for his firm. According to the Nikkei report, Intel leadership expects to "deliver 40 million AI PCs" this year and a further 60 million units next year—representing "more than 20% of the projected total global PC market in 2025." Feng and his colleagues predict that mainstream customers will prefer to use local "on-device" AI solutions (equipped with NPUs), rather than rely on remote cloud services. Significant Edge AI improvements are expected to arrive with next generation Lunar Lake and Arrow Lake processor families, the latter will be bringing Team Blue NPU technologies to desktop platforms—AMD's Ryzen 8000G series of AM5 APUs launched with XDNA engines last month.

Intel announced today that it is reviving the Altera brand name for its new standalone FPGA (field-programmable gate array) company. The business was previously known as Intel's Programmable Solutions Group before being spun off into an independent entity two months ago. The chipmaking giant acquired Altera in 2015 for $16.7 billion to bolster its FPGA capabilities. Using the well-known Altera moniker for the new standalone company signals Intel's confidence in the FPGA market opportunity, which it estimates to be over $55 billion across data centers, communications, and embedded segments. As a standalone company with its own board of directors, Altera will be able to focus exclusively on the FPGA market. Intel will remain a majority shareholder, but outside investment could help fund expansion plans.

Altera plans to build on the Programmable Solutions Group's recent efforts targeting lower-end and mid-range FPGAs for embedded devices in industrial, automotive and aerospace/defense applications. According to Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger, independence will give Altera "the mandate, focus and resources to better capitalize on the attractive expected growth of FPGAs." The revival of the Altera brand and refocus on the FPGA market comes alongside Intel's plan to invest heavily in new chip factories and advanced manufacturing capabilities. With Altera as a standalone business, Intel aims to be a significant player in the expected high growth of the global FPGA industry. Alongside new naming, Altera is introducing Agilex 9, which is now in volume production; Agilex 7 F-series and I-series released to production; Agilex 5 now broadly available, and Agilex 3 coming soon, with functions for cloud, communications and intelligent edge applications. Below, you can see the specification table of the upcoming FPGAs.

Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger engaged with press/media representatives following the conclusion of his IFS Direct Connect 2024 keynote speech—when asked about Team Blue's ongoing relationship with TSMC, he confirmed that their manufacturing agreement has advanced from "5 nm to 3 nm." According to a China Times news article: "Gelsinger also confirmed the expansion of orders to TSMC, confirming that TSMC will hold orders for Intel's Arrow and Lunar Lake CPU, GPU, and NPU chips this year, and will produce them using the N3B process, officially ushering in the Intel notebook platform that the outside world has been waiting for many years." Past leaks have indicated that Intel's Arrow Lake processor family will have CPU tiles based on their in-house 20A process, while TSMC takes care of the GPU tile aspect with their 3 nm N3 process node.

That generation is expected to launch later this year—the now "officially confirmed" upgrade to 3 nm should produce pleasing performance and efficiency improvements. The current crop of Core Ultra "Meteor Lake" mobile processors has struggled with the latter, especially when compared to rivals. Lunar Lake is marked down for a 2025 launch window, so some aspects of its internal workings remain a mystery—Gelsinger has confirmed that TSMC's N3B is in the picture, but no official source has disclosed their in-house manufacturing choice(s) for LNL chips. Wccftech believes that Lunar Lake will: "utilize the same P-Core (Lion Cove) and brand-new E-Core (Skymont) core architecture which are expected to be fabricated on the 20A node. But that might also be limited to the CPU tile. The GPU tile will be a significant upgrade over the Meteor Lake and Arrow Lake CPUs since Lunar Lake ditches Alchemist and goes for the next-gen graphics architecture codenamed "Battlemage" (AKA Xe2-LPG)." Late January whispers pointed to Intel and TSMC partnering up on a 2 nanometer process for the "Nova Lake" processor generation—perhaps a very distant prospect (2026).

US Commerce Secretary, Gina Raimondo, was a notable guest speaker during yesterday's Intel Foundry Direct Connect Keynote—she was invited on (via a video link) to discuss the matter of strengthening the nation's semiconductor industry, and staying competitive with global rivals. During discussions, Pat Gelsinger (Intel CEO) cheekily asked whether a "CHIPS Act Part Two" was in the pipeline. Raimondo responded by stating that she is till busy with the original $52 billion tranche: "I'm out of breath running as fast as I can implementing CHIPS One." Earlier this week, her department revealed a $1.5 billion planned direct fund for GlobalFoundries: "this investment will enable GF to expand and create new manufacturing capacity and capabilities to securely produce more essential chips for automotive, IoT, aerospace, defense, and other vital markets."

Intel is set to receive a large grant courtesy of the US government's 2022-launched CHIPS and Science Act—exact figures have not been revealed to the public, but a Nikkei Asia report suggests that Team Blue will be benefiting significantly in the near future: "While the Commerce Department has not yet announced how much of the funding package's $52 billion it would grant Intel, the American chipmaker is expected to get a significant portion, according to analysts and officials close to the situation." Raimondo stated that: "Intel is an American champion company and has a very huge role to play in this revitalization." The US Commerce Chief also revealed that she had spoken with artificial intelligence industry leaders, including OpenAI's Sam Altman, about the ever-growing demand for AI-crunching processors/accelerators/GPUs. The country's semiconductor production efforts could be bolstered once more, in order to preserve a competitive edge—Raimondo addressed Gelsinger's jokey request for another batch of subsidies: "I suspect there will have to be—whether you call it Chips Two or something else—continued investment if we want to lead the world...We fell pretty far. We took our eye off the ball."

Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger, speaking at the Intel Foundry Services (IFS) Direct Connect event, confirmed to Tom's Hardware that he hopes to turn IFS into the West's premier foundry company, and a direct technological and volume rival to TSMC. He said that there is a clear line of distinction between Intel Products and Intel Foundry, and that later this year, IFS will be more legally distinct from Intel, becoming its own entity. The only way Gelsinger sees IFS being competitive to TSMC, is by making its most advanced semiconductor manufacturing nodes and 3D chip packaging innovations available to foundry customers other than itself (Intel Products), even if it means providing them to companies that directly compete with Intel products, such as AMD and Qualcomm.

Paul Alcorn of Tom's Hardware asked CEO Gelsinger "Intel will now offer its process nodes to some of its competitors, and there may be situations wherein your product teams are competing directly with competitors that are enabled by your crown jewels. How do you plan to navigate those types of situations and maybe soothe ruffled feathers on your product teams?" To this, Gelsinger responded "Well, if you go back to the picture I showed today, Paul, there are Intel products and Intel foundry, There's a clean line between those, and as I said on the last earnings call, we'll have a setup separate legal entity for Intel foundry this year," Gelsinger responded. "We'll start posting separate financials associated with that going forward. And the foundry team's objective is simple: Fill. The. Fabs. Deliver to the broadest set of customers on the planet."

During his keynote address today at Intel Foundry Direct Connect, Intel's inaugural foundry event, CEO Pat Gelsinger introduced four members of the company's Foundry Advisory Committee. The committee advises Intel on its IDM 2.0 strategy, including creation and development of a thriving systems foundry for the AI era.
The advisory committee includes leaders from the semiconductor industry and academia, two of whom are also members of Intel's board of directors:

• Chi-Foon Chan, former Co-CEO of Synopsys; former Microprocessor Group general manager at NEC; director at PDF Solutions.
• Joe Kaeser, former CEO of Siemens; supervisory board chair at Siemens Energy and Daimler Truck; supervisory board member at Linde; former member of the board of NXP semiconductor; member of the board of trustees at the World Economic Forum.
• Tsu-Jae King Liu, vice chair of the Foundry Advisory Committee; dean of College of Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley; Intel director; and director at MaxLinear.
• Lip-Bu Tan, chair of the Foundry Advisory Committee; former CEO of Cadence Design Systems; chairman of Walden International; and Intel director; director at Credo Technology Group and Schneider Electric.

The JEDEC Board of Directors presented its prestigious 2024 Distinguished Executive Leadership Award to Intel CEO, Pat Gelsinger, in a ceremony held at Intel's offices in Santa Clara, CA earlier this month. This award stands as JEDEC's highest honor and recognizes the most distinguished senior executives in the electronics industry who promote and support the advancement of JEDEC standards.

"Throughout Pat Gelsinger's distinguished career, he has consistently championed the development of open standards, as evidenced by Intel's contributions in this domain. Under his leadership, Intel has made a tremendous impact on many groundbreaking memory and IO technologies in JEDEC," said Mian Quddus, JEDEC Board of Directors Chairman. He added, "JEDEC is grateful for his invaluable support and that of the Intel team."