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Wow, I always thought Intel will go bankrupt but I guess it’s clear that US is going to back them. Gotta give Intel a lifeline because the longtime strategy o

Wow, I always thought Intel will go bankrupt but I guess it’s clear that US is going to back them. Gotta give Intel a lifeline because the longtime strategy of in-house design+manufacturing no longer works when you lost the manufacturing edge, when you missed the transitions to mobile and GPU, and when you are stuck with the same crappy designs for the one market you dominate: server.

eulers_secret 5y ago
How would Intel go bankrupt when their net income is still $20 billion? Sure they’re loosing some ground, but I see no indicators they’re at risk of a near-term bankruptcy...
- klelatti 5y ago
  I don't think bankruptcy is likely at all but they have more competition than for a long time (if ever) in their most profitable markets. I don't think backwards looking measures like historic earnings are that useful - if you look at the price / earnings ratio of 12 that tells you that the market is sceptical about Intel's prospects.
- b9a2cab5 5y ago
  If Sapphire Rapids and Meteor Lake fail they might be in danger. Increasingly the threat is not AMD but Arm, since cloud hyperscalers can bring CPU design in house and undercut x86 and Arm's fixed length instruction encoding is fundamentally better for very wide decoders.
- DSingularity 5y ago
  Once they stutter it’s game over. You have to research and build fabs years before you start using them. What happens when they get stuck and fall behind TSMC for a few generations?
  - 0x456 5y ago
    Intel can just use TSMC to build their chips: https://9to5mac.com/2021/01/08/bloomberg-intel-considering-outsourcing-some-production-to-apple-chip-maker-tsmc/ https://9to5mac.com/2021/01/08/bloomberg-intel-considering-o... If second place wasn't fatal for TSMC, AMD, or ARM, perhaps it won't be for Intel either?
    - klelatti 5y ago
      But TSMC and ARM have very different business models. AMD divested their manufacturing capability in order to compete. The question I think isn't whether Intel will be around - they will - but what will their business look like in 5-10 years time.
    - DSingularity 5y ago
      AMD spun off its fabs because they actually had good designs but couldn’t keep up in manufacturing. TSMC and ARM had different business models. Now, Intel never had the best designs but they had the best manufacturing. Now they are third place in both. Third place but spending as if it’s going to continue to dominate for the next decade. What’s going to happen when it writes off an entire fab?
MangoCoffee 5y ago
>Intel will go bankrupt why and how? Intel still have a good share of x86 market.
- Turing_Machine 5y ago
  I'd be surprised if x86 is still a major thing in 5 years, and very surprised if it was still a major thing in 10 years. It's had a good run, but it's 40 years old (with, granted, many extensions and improvements). Sometimes you need to start with a fresh sheet of paper. Apple's M1 was the first shot across the bow, and I believe AMD has an ARM-like architecture in development as well.
  - passivate 5y ago
    I've been hearing that about ARM for more than a decade. Whats different now?
    - Miraste 5y ago
      Nothing's different, this is the culmination of the last decade's work. These changes are slow, but ARM is now as fast or faster than x86 in several contexts while being vastly more efficient, and looks likely to continue improving at a better rate. ARM has started appearing in laptops, desktops, and servers. x86 is running out of bastions.
      - passivate 5y ago
        If ARM is getting vastly more efficient then why is the battery life of smartphones not getting vastly-better? Where is the benefit to the end user?
        Miraste 5y ago
        I said ARM is vastly more efficient than x86, not previous implementations of ARM. You can see this in action in the new MacBooks, which do indeed have like 4x the battery life of the x86 versions.
heartbreak 5y ago
Even if Intel was at risk, bankruptcy doesn’t mean the company evaporates off the face of the earth.

eulers_secret 5y ago

How would Intel go bankrupt when their net income is still $20 billion? Sure they’re loosing some ground, but I see no indicators they’re at risk of a near-term bankruptcy...

klelatti 5y ago
I don't think bankruptcy is likely at all but they have more competition than for a long time (if ever) in their most profitable markets. I don't think backwards looking measures like historic earnings are that useful - if you look at the price / earnings ratio of 12 that tells you that the market is sceptical about Intel's prospects.
b9a2cab5 5y ago
If Sapphire Rapids and Meteor Lake fail they might be in danger. Increasingly the threat is not AMD but Arm, since cloud hyperscalers can bring CPU design in house and undercut x86 and Arm's fixed length instruction encoding is fundamentally better for very wide decoders.
DSingularity 5y ago
Once they stutter it’s game over. You have to research and build fabs years before you start using them. What happens when they get stuck and fall behind TSMC for a few generations?
- 0x456 5y ago
  Intel can just use TSMC to build their chips: https://9to5mac.com/2021/01/08/bloomberg-intel-considering-outsourcing-some-production-to-apple-chip-maker-tsmc/ https://9to5mac.com/2021/01/08/bloomberg-intel-considering-o... If second place wasn't fatal for TSMC, AMD, or ARM, perhaps it won't be for Intel either?
  - klelatti 5y ago
    But TSMC and ARM have very different business models. AMD divested their manufacturing capability in order to compete. The question I think isn't whether Intel will be around - they will - but what will their business look like in 5-10 years time.
  - DSingularity 5y ago
    AMD spun off its fabs because they actually had good designs but couldn’t keep up in manufacturing. TSMC and ARM had different business models. Now, Intel never had the best designs but they had the best manufacturing. Now they are third place in both. Third place but spending as if it’s going to continue to dominate for the next decade. What’s going to happen when it writes off an entire fab?

MangoCoffee 5y ago

>Intel will go bankrupt why and how? Intel still have a good share of x86 market.

Turing_Machine 5y ago
I'd be surprised if x86 is still a major thing in 5 years, and very surprised if it was still a major thing in 10 years. It's had a good run, but it's 40 years old (with, granted, many extensions and improvements). Sometimes you need to start with a fresh sheet of paper. Apple's M1 was the first shot across the bow, and I believe AMD has an ARM-like architecture in development as well.
- passivate 5y ago
  I've been hearing that about ARM for more than a decade. Whats different now?
  - Miraste 5y ago
    Nothing's different, this is the culmination of the last decade's work. These changes are slow, but ARM is now as fast or faster than x86 in several contexts while being vastly more efficient, and looks likely to continue improving at a better rate. ARM has started appearing in laptops, desktops, and servers. x86 is running out of bastions.
    - passivate 5y ago
      If ARM is getting vastly more efficient then why is the battery life of smartphones not getting vastly-better? Where is the benefit to the end user?
      - Miraste 5y ago
        I said ARM is vastly more efficient than x86, not previous implementations of ARM. You can see this in action in the new MacBooks, which do indeed have like 4x the battery life of the x86 versions.

heartbreak 5y ago

Even if Intel was at risk, bankruptcy doesn’t mean the company evaporates off the face of the earth.