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This reads like a just-so story. Apple has engaged in the same dividend & buyback game, and has also made their executives wealthier than Crassus, but no one wo

This reads like a just-so story. Apple has engaged in the same dividend & buyback game, and has also made their executives wealthier than Crassus, but no one would argue that they've lost their leadership position. In fact, you could easily argue that their relative position has improved significantly since Tim Cook's Apple started aggressively paring down the growth of their cash position that had reached near absurd levels under Jobs. Intel made strategic errors, namely not being willing to sacrifice some control and short-term margins to dominate the mobile space.

intelinsider 5y ago
I work for Intel, so here is a first-hand data point: I have worked for a number of large organizations in my career, including the U.S. government and several large companies, but Intel is the hands-down champion of dysfunctional bureaucracy. Case in point: last week I took a week off. When I came back, I discovered that my remote access had been disabled. It turns out that my contract happened to be up for renewal during the week I was off and someone entered an incorrect date, so I was effectively fired while I was away but I was not notified, nor was anyone in my chain of command. This happened on Monday, and today is Friday, and they still have not managed to get me reinstated. And that is just the most recent in a long list of similar incidents. So yes, Intel's market failures cannot be attributed entirely to financialization. They have screwed up in many, many ways.
- morpheos137 5y ago
  How many other people do you imagine this sequence of events happened to over the past two weeks? To me it looks like you doxed yourself while also desparaging your former employer. So maybe you will remain fired?
  - daanlo 5y ago
    Imho, if above comment were a reason to be fired at intel, then it really wouldn‘t be an organization worth working for.
  - intelinsider 5y ago
    I haven't been fired. I am in a weird limbo state where part of the bureaucracy thinks I've been suspended but other parts know that this is just an administrative error and are trying to fix it. So I'm still being paid, I'm just unable to actually do any work because my security credentials were accidentally revoked (because part of the bureaucracy thought I was due to be fired because someone entered the wrong date into the system) and no one seems to know how to restore them despite the fact that everyone agrees that this is what needs to be done. And, like I said, this is not an isolated incident. I don't know if this particular problem has ever happened to anyone else, but I have experienced similar issues that have affected others in addition to myself. This sort of thing happens regularly. No one is at all surprised by it. There are multiple processes that are deeply broken with no possibility of fixing them. Here is another example: the design group I work with has been assigned a shared storage area of 100GB -- and no, that is not a typo: one hundred gigabytes shared across a dozen engineers. And we do chip design, so we generate lots of data. Needless to say, that shared storage is always very nearly full, and we get regular emails nagging us to delete stuff that we no longer need. So we have a dozen engineers spending time triaging their data in order to save a few dollars on storage costs. Yes, it is every bit as insane as it sounds. I once tried to point out that this is insane, with the result being that I was admonished for being a troublemaker. So now I don't bother any more. So there is no doubt in my mind that at least some of Intel's troubles are entirely of their own making, and I'm in a position to know.
    - Red_Leaves_Flyy 5y ago
      That’s absurd. 100gb is a few bucks a month on [cloud provider]. Wouldn’t it be cheaper to expand it instead of micro managing the talent?
    - 908B64B197 5y ago
      > Here is another example: the design group I work with has been assigned a shared storage area of 100GB -- and no, that is not a typo: one hundred gigabytes shared across a dozen engineers. And we do chip design, so we generate lots of data. I remember a late 90's labs with that type of storage. Any chances you somehow posted this from your Sun Machine?
    - 5y ago
  - gofsckyourslf 5y ago
    Thanks morpheos137 for helping me to understand my place. I'm obviously delusional and my suicide will help clean the gene pool. Thanks so much, morpheos137 for helping me to better understand and accept this cold, hard reality. Tell you what. If I commit suicide now and if there's an afterlife that allows this, I'll pay you a visit as a ghost. I won't torment you like I've been. I'll just do everything in my power to help you understand how much of a piece of shit you were to me, and how wrong dang was to let you out of your malicious ape cage, after helping drive a stranger to suicide. I hope I am wrong and nothingness awaits. In that case, there won't be any visits and you can continue with your malice against others. You know, to help clean the gene pool of mentally ill folks. Good riddance, ape species. dang, that was dead wrong to let that ape out of his malice cage.
- realmod 5y ago
  If I were you, I'd change or delete this comment. You've mentioned specific details which would make it very easy to identify you. And disparaging your company when you are already in a precarious situation is not ideal.
  - Wowfunhappy 5y ago
    I agree, and OP, remember you can use the support email at the bottom of the site for this sort of thing (since you probably can’t edit the comment yourself at this point).
  - Red_Leaves_Flyy 5y ago
    Being fired for complaining about dysfunctional corporate bureaucracy is absolutely ridiculous. I’m not saying someone lying about or slandering their employer should go unpunished, but everyone, everywhere should be entirely free to criticize their employer for valid concerns, in private and in public. Anything less creates a further tilts the power imbalance between employees and their employer in favor of the employer. This is bad for labor markets and can slowly destroy companies from the inside.
  - antisthenes 5y ago
    > You've mentioned specific details which would make it very easy to identify you Not in a dysfunctional bureaucracy! If he was so easily identifiable, they wouldn't have disabled his remote access, hah!
- straw_hat 5y ago
  Short INTC 56, 60, 65 Stop loss on all three lots at 70
steveBK123 5y ago
Exactly. Missing mobile means they missed the area of the market with the most explosive growth in the last 10+ years. Likewise they never got into GPUs which have also had a lot of growth between crypto, data science/ML, and of course gaming. Intel may have had enough $$ for R&D.. but competitors raking in margins in the ARM/GPU side of the world probably had more, and were more successful in iterating their product line more rapidly.
- TMWNN 5y ago
  >Likewise they never got into GPUs which have also had a lot of growth between crypto, data science/ML, and of course gaming. Not for lack of trying. The new Intel GPU line is the third or fourth attempt to break into that market.
tolbish 5y ago
Apple spends more on buybacks than on R&D like Intel has done recently?
- twoodfin 5y ago
  Apple is notorious for being selective about what they classify as true R&D, but it’s not even close: $18.75 billion in 2020 on R&D [1] $77 billion on buybacks in the last four quarters [2] [1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/273006/apple-expenses-for-research-and-development/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/273006/apple-expenses-fo... [2] https://www.barrons.com/articles/tech-giants-have-ramped-up-stock-buybacks-apple-is-the-champ-51619780412 https://www.barrons.com/articles/tech-giants-have-ramped-up-...

intelinsider 5y ago

I work for Intel, so here is a first-hand data point: I have worked for a number of large organizations in my career, including the U.S. government and several large companies, but Intel is the hands-down champion of dysfunctional bureaucracy. Case in point: last week I took a week off. When I came back, I discovered that my remote access had been disabled. It turns out that my contract happened to be up for renewal during the week I was off and someone entered an incorrect date, so I was effectively fired while I was away but I was not notified, nor was anyone in my chain of command. This happened on Monday, and today is Friday, and they still have not managed to get me reinstated. And that is just the most recent in a long list of similar incidents. So yes, Intel's market failures cannot be attributed entirely to financialization. They have screwed up in many, many ways.

morpheos137 5y ago
How many other people do you imagine this sequence of events happened to over the past two weeks? To me it looks like you doxed yourself while also desparaging your former employer. So maybe you will remain fired?
- daanlo 5y ago
  Imho, if above comment were a reason to be fired at intel, then it really wouldn‘t be an organization worth working for.
- intelinsider 5y ago
  I haven't been fired. I am in a weird limbo state where part of the bureaucracy thinks I've been suspended but other parts know that this is just an administrative error and are trying to fix it. So I'm still being paid, I'm just unable to actually do any work because my security credentials were accidentally revoked (because part of the bureaucracy thought I was due to be fired because someone entered the wrong date into the system) and no one seems to know how to restore them despite the fact that everyone agrees that this is what needs to be done. And, like I said, this is not an isolated incident. I don't know if this particular problem has ever happened to anyone else, but I have experienced similar issues that have affected others in addition to myself. This sort of thing happens regularly. No one is at all surprised by it. There are multiple processes that are deeply broken with no possibility of fixing them. Here is another example: the design group I work with has been assigned a shared storage area of 100GB -- and no, that is not a typo: one hundred gigabytes shared across a dozen engineers. And we do chip design, so we generate lots of data. Needless to say, that shared storage is always very nearly full, and we get regular emails nagging us to delete stuff that we no longer need. So we have a dozen engineers spending time triaging their data in order to save a few dollars on storage costs. Yes, it is every bit as insane as it sounds. I once tried to point out that this is insane, with the result being that I was admonished for being a troublemaker. So now I don't bother any more. So there is no doubt in my mind that at least some of Intel's troubles are entirely of their own making, and I'm in a position to know.
  - Red_Leaves_Flyy 5y ago
    That’s absurd. 100gb is a few bucks a month on [cloud provider]. Wouldn’t it be cheaper to expand it instead of micro managing the talent?
  - 908B64B197 5y ago
    > Here is another example: the design group I work with has been assigned a shared storage area of 100GB -- and no, that is not a typo: one hundred gigabytes shared across a dozen engineers. And we do chip design, so we generate lots of data. I remember a late 90's labs with that type of storage. Any chances you somehow posted this from your Sun Machine?
  - 5y ago
- gofsckyourslf 5y ago
  Thanks morpheos137 for helping me to understand my place. I'm obviously delusional and my suicide will help clean the gene pool. Thanks so much, morpheos137 for helping me to better understand and accept this cold, hard reality. Tell you what. If I commit suicide now and if there's an afterlife that allows this, I'll pay you a visit as a ghost. I won't torment you like I've been. I'll just do everything in my power to help you understand how much of a piece of shit you were to me, and how wrong dang was to let you out of your malicious ape cage, after helping drive a stranger to suicide. I hope I am wrong and nothingness awaits. In that case, there won't be any visits and you can continue with your malice against others. You know, to help clean the gene pool of mentally ill folks. Good riddance, ape species. dang, that was dead wrong to let that ape out of his malice cage.
realmod 5y ago
If I were you, I'd change or delete this comment. You've mentioned specific details which would make it very easy to identify you. And disparaging your company when you are already in a precarious situation is not ideal.
- Wowfunhappy 5y ago
  I agree, and OP, remember you can use the support email at the bottom of the site for this sort of thing (since you probably can’t edit the comment yourself at this point).
- Red_Leaves_Flyy 5y ago
  Being fired for complaining about dysfunctional corporate bureaucracy is absolutely ridiculous. I’m not saying someone lying about or slandering their employer should go unpunished, but everyone, everywhere should be entirely free to criticize their employer for valid concerns, in private and in public. Anything less creates a further tilts the power imbalance between employees and their employer in favor of the employer. This is bad for labor markets and can slowly destroy companies from the inside.
- antisthenes 5y ago
  > You've mentioned specific details which would make it very easy to identify you Not in a dysfunctional bureaucracy! If he was so easily identifiable, they wouldn't have disabled his remote access, hah!
straw_hat 5y ago
Short INTC 56, 60, 65 Stop loss on all three lots at 70

steveBK123 5y ago

Exactly. Missing mobile means they missed the area of the market with the most explosive growth in the last 10+ years. Likewise they never got into GPUs which have also had a lot of growth between crypto, data science/ML, and of course gaming. Intel may have had enough $$ for R&D.. but competitors raking in margins in the ARM/GPU side of the world probably had more, and were more successful in iterating their product line more rapidly.

TMWNN 5y ago
>Likewise they never got into GPUs which have also had a lot of growth between crypto, data science/ML, and of course gaming. Not for lack of trying. The new Intel GPU line is the third or fourth attempt to break into that market.

tolbish 5y ago

Apple spends more on buybacks than on R&D like Intel has done recently?

twoodfin 5y ago
Apple is notorious for being selective about what they classify as true R&D, but it’s not even close: $18.75 billion in 2020 on R&D [1] $77 billion on buybacks in the last four quarters [2] [1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/273006/apple-expenses-for-research-and-development/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/273006/apple-expenses-fo... [2] https://www.barrons.com/articles/tech-giants-have-ramped-up-stock-buybacks-apple-is-the-champ-51619780412 https://www.barrons.com/articles/tech-giants-have-ramped-up-...