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I am not sure what Intel can do to come back to a strong position. Afaik, all of Nvidia, Apple and Qualcomm (dunno about AMD) pay significantly higher wages th

by screye 6y ago

I am not sure what Intel can do to come back to a strong position. Afaik, all of Nvidia, Apple and Qualcomm (dunno about AMD) pay significantly higher wages than Intel. If Intel is starting off on the back foot and cannot get top talent, then their decline is all but guaranteed.

dragontamer 6y ago
Intel is losing to TSMC most of all, in the manufacturing front. Intel needs to reach 10nm and 7nm, and they needed to do that 5 years ago.
- akmarinov 6y ago
  Sadly, it’s looking like Intel won’t do 5nm until 2023 at which point TSMC is projecting 3nm. They won’t be able to catch up. On the other hand Intel is a huge national security interest for the US, so expect the government to help them out where possible.
  - pastrami_panda 6y ago
    > On the other hand Intel is a huge national security interest for the US This. I'm actually surprised they have grown so uncompetitive considering the critical products their CPUs are presumably used in. But Intel has been a money making machine for many years, I don't think most people realize the amount of resources they've accumulated when they compare them to AMD et al. I just hope they don't make more lousy investments and actually focus on sorting out their core business problems.
  - beezle 6y ago
    First (and I'm no expert here) I don't believe that (x)nm is the be all end all of cpu performance. Architecture still matters. Second, perhaps the AMD/Apple fan boys have not noticed but Intel has many times the volume of AMD and whatever ARM volume Apple will have (Apple is typically 10% of lap/desktop sales, up this year from Covid). The world requires Intel to meet its computing needs and no magic wand will give the other guys that capacity anytime soon. It is way to early to count Intel out.
    - tomjen3 6y ago
      If you can get it there is no reason not to buy an AMD product in a laptop, or to design one in, unless you absolutely need thunderbolt support. And laptops sells way more than desktops do. This is a winner takes all market and there is no reason to go with the loser.
      - fomine3 6y ago
        Intel Ice/Tiger Lake Platform has still advantages for idle or light use (not heavy computing) power consumption on mobile thanks to their continuous improvement.
    - dragontamer 6y ago
      > First (and I'm no expert here) I don't believe that (x)nm is the be all end all of cpu performance. Architecture still matters. The same architecture on a smaller process will use less power and use less silicon (usually making it cheaper: but yields make that equation complicated). A 100mm^2 design using 50W will only be 50mm^2 using only 25W on a smaller node. Since 300mm wafers are always 70,000 mm^2 in area, you now produce twice as many designs in 50mm^2 instead of 100mm^2. ------- Now what made Intel get stuck on 14nm+++ is that Intel got really good at increasing 14nm++++'s clock rate. Dennard scaling is dead: a larger process may offer better GHz these days. But if you can solve the yield issues, the march towards tinier and tinier transistors is a winner. Less power used, less chip-area used, and therefore cheaper and more-efficient chips.
yesimahuman 6y ago
Reminds me of when I went to visit Intel a few years ago. I was shocked at the bare bones amenities and that employees had to pay for everything (snacks/drinks/etc.). That might sound insignificant but in the talent war in SV that stuff mattered a lot back then. It was a stark contrast from nearly every other fast-growing tech company in the area.
- NobodyNada 6y ago
  > employees had to pay for everything (snacks/drinks/etc.). That’s not entirely true, at least in Hillsboro (I interned there recently). Drinks were free, and so was fruit, but you had to pay for e.g. donuts or chips.
  - rdiddly 6y ago
    The fruit's hilarious because if you're a contractor the fruit's not free. It's forbidden fruit.
    - NobodyNada 6y ago
      Ah yeah, I forgot to mention that part. Contractors have to pay for a weekly subscription to the drinks and fruit.
  - tonyedgecombe 6y ago
    Which is not a bad policy. I'm not sure I would want to work somewhere that offered free junk food.
- Animats 6y ago
  Ah, Intel. Acre-sized floors of tiny cubicles. Everything is grey. Really.[1] I visited Intel HQ once, and it really did look like that. Is it still like that? [1] https://youtu.be/gXReifFHXbY?t=44 https://youtu.be/gXReifFHXbY?t=44
  - eznzt 6y ago
rmk 6y ago
Is this really true, though? There are different types of job functions involved in designing and producing a new generation of a processor. Perhaps they have a tiered system wherein they will retain key talent by compensating it right? Second, if you are a PhD in this area (a hybrid of Computer Engineering and Computer Science, and I believe that a PhD in this area is the minimum qualification for this type of work) then you do not have a large pool of employers to choose from in the first place, so any employer that's competing for folks from this group will likely end up with a decent number of talented people anyway.
graton 6y ago
Yep. Intel aims to pay in the 50th percentile for jobs. The problem with that is that many FAANG like companies can literally pay the top employees twice or more to come work for them. A lot of the top-talent has left Intel and I think that will continue. Unfortunately for Intel most of the mediocre employees have stayed.

by screye 6y ago

dragontamer 6y ago

Intel is losing to TSMC most of all, in the manufacturing front. Intel needs to reach 10nm and 7nm, and they needed to do that 5 years ago.

akmarinov 6y ago
Sadly, it’s looking like Intel won’t do 5nm until 2023 at which point TSMC is projecting 3nm. They won’t be able to catch up. On the other hand Intel is a huge national security interest for the US, so expect the government to help them out where possible.
- pastrami_panda 6y ago
  > On the other hand Intel is a huge national security interest for the US This. I'm actually surprised they have grown so uncompetitive considering the critical products their CPUs are presumably used in. But Intel has been a money making machine for many years, I don't think most people realize the amount of resources they've accumulated when they compare them to AMD et al. I just hope they don't make more lousy investments and actually focus on sorting out their core business problems.
- beezle 6y ago
  First (and I'm no expert here) I don't believe that (x)nm is the be all end all of cpu performance. Architecture still matters. Second, perhaps the AMD/Apple fan boys have not noticed but Intel has many times the volume of AMD and whatever ARM volume Apple will have (Apple is typically 10% of lap/desktop sales, up this year from Covid). The world requires Intel to meet its computing needs and no magic wand will give the other guys that capacity anytime soon. It is way to early to count Intel out.
  - tomjen3 6y ago
    If you can get it there is no reason not to buy an AMD product in a laptop, or to design one in, unless you absolutely need thunderbolt support. And laptops sells way more than desktops do. This is a winner takes all market and there is no reason to go with the loser.
    - fomine3 6y ago
      Intel Ice/Tiger Lake Platform has still advantages for idle or light use (not heavy computing) power consumption on mobile thanks to their continuous improvement.
  - dragontamer 6y ago
    > First (and I'm no expert here) I don't believe that (x)nm is the be all end all of cpu performance. Architecture still matters. The same architecture on a smaller process will use less power and use less silicon (usually making it cheaper: but yields make that equation complicated). A 100mm^2 design using 50W will only be 50mm^2 using only 25W on a smaller node. Since 300mm wafers are always 70,000 mm^2 in area, you now produce twice as many designs in 50mm^2 instead of 100mm^2. ------- Now what made Intel get stuck on 14nm+++ is that Intel got really good at increasing 14nm++++'s clock rate. Dennard scaling is dead: a larger process may offer better GHz these days. But if you can solve the yield issues, the march towards tinier and tinier transistors is a winner. Less power used, less chip-area used, and therefore cheaper and more-efficient chips.

yesimahuman 6y ago

Reminds me of when I went to visit Intel a few years ago. I was shocked at the bare bones amenities and that employees had to pay for everything (snacks/drinks/etc.). That might sound insignificant but in the talent war in SV that stuff mattered a lot back then. It was a stark contrast from nearly every other fast-growing tech company in the area.

NobodyNada 6y ago
> employees had to pay for everything (snacks/drinks/etc.). That’s not entirely true, at least in Hillsboro (I interned there recently). Drinks were free, and so was fruit, but you had to pay for e.g. donuts or chips.
- rdiddly 6y ago
  The fruit's hilarious because if you're a contractor the fruit's not free. It's forbidden fruit.
  - NobodyNada 6y ago
    Ah yeah, I forgot to mention that part. Contractors have to pay for a weekly subscription to the drinks and fruit.
- tonyedgecombe 6y ago
  Which is not a bad policy. I'm not sure I would want to work somewhere that offered free junk food.
Animats 6y ago
Ah, Intel. Acre-sized floors of tiny cubicles. Everything is grey. Really.[1] I visited Intel HQ once, and it really did look like that. Is it still like that? [1] https://youtu.be/gXReifFHXbY?t=44 https://youtu.be/gXReifFHXbY?t=44
- eznzt 6y ago

rmk 6y ago

Is this really true, though? There are different types of job functions involved in designing and producing a new generation of a processor. Perhaps they have a tiered system wherein they will retain key talent by compensating it right? Second, if you are a PhD in this area (a hybrid of Computer Engineering and Computer Science, and I believe that a PhD in this area is the minimum qualification for this type of work) then you do not have a large pool of employers to choose from in the first place, so any employer that's competing for folks from this group will likely end up with a decent number of talented people anyway.

graton 6y ago

Yep. Intel aims to pay in the 50th percentile for jobs. The problem with that is that many FAANG like companies can literally pay the top employees twice or more to come work for them. A lot of the top-talent has left Intel and I think that will continue. Unfortunately for Intel most of the mediocre employees have stayed.