I think not that they couldn't but as they say, you don't have be able to outrun the bear, just the guy with you. Not that they couldn't, just they couldn't be

I think not that they couldn't but as they say, you don't have be able to outrun the bear, just the guy with you. Not that they couldn't, just they couldn't beat ARM. And ARM already had a solid footing in the dumb phone space. I think four things. Two Technical and two business. 0x86's innate power consumption per bit of state change is higher than ARM's. Lack of experience with low power process. No one wants to pay the Intel Tax. And Intel isn't very nice to their customers.