4 ms·

He Was Going to Save Intel. He Destroyed $150B of Value Instead

9 points by impish9208 2y ago

impish9208 2y ago
Gift link: https://www.wsj.com/tech/intel-ceo-pat-gelsinger-chips-bd4d61f9?st=vRcbME https://www.wsj.com/tech/intel-ceo-pat-gelsinger-chips-bd4d6...
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
not_your_vase 2y ago
What an uncharitable title... On the other hand of course, maybe just because someone is a genius when it comes to technical problems, doesn't mean that the same person is a genius when it comes to other, non-technical problems...
FrankWilhoit 2y ago
Gelsinger's plan depended on government subsidies and as such, it could not be Trump-proofed. Once you take government money, taking government money becomes the mission: cf. defense contractors.
- Zigurd 2y ago
  DoD work was always part of the foundry plan.
- wmf 2y ago
  IMO the subsidies are a small part of Intel's turnaround. The company needs to become fundamentally viable regardless of subsidies.
BeetleB 2y ago
Lots of problems with this article. Let's begin with: > In late October, the company reported its largest quarterly loss ever, a stunning $16.6 billion net loss that was especially surprising because Wall Street analysts had forecast a loss of $1.1 billion. The real loss is closer to $1.1B than $16.6B. The rest of it is a paper loss. Intel had announced layoffs, and was slated to give out generous severance and retirement packages. In addition, there were other restructuring costs and depreciating costs that were expected over time. The tax and accounting rules allow the company to claim those losses all at once - even if they've not been realized yet. > A series of manufacturing missteps clouded its long-term fortunes under CEO Brian Krzanich, who resigned in 2018 after having a relationship with an employee that violated company policy. No - he didn't resign. He was fired. And although the official reason was his relationship with an employee, that was merely a pretext to speed up the process. He was fired because of poor performance. And that affair started and ended prior to his becoming a CEO. The anti-fraternization policy came into effect in 2011, and he didn't end it immediately, but towards the end of that year. The board dug up that 7 year old infraction to find an excuse to fire him. And finally, the article doesn't really show how he destroyed $150B of value. Much of that value would have been destroyed regardless, because the fabs were in poor shape, which is precisely what Pat aimed to fix. He just happened to join when the stock was at an all time high. At that time, and until recently, the fabs were way behind TSMC - so any products made at Intel fabs would not compete. The demand for PCs has dropped, and AMD was tiny enough that a minor absolute increase is seen as a large percentage increase. As an example, when demand dropped 25%, Intel's sales dropped 33%, and AMD accounted for the remaining 8%. But an 8% drop in Intel's sales is likely a 30-40% increase in AMDs. Intel's failures in the AI space (various companies bought, failed GPU attempts) is very real, though. But due to declining PC sales, the company was short on cash and had to choose: Continue with the foundry plans and put GPUs on the back burner or abandon the foundry plans. If PC sales hadn't declined, they may still be working on the GPU. Most of the value lost this year was because they publicized the foundry's financials. Personally, I was surprised at the sharp drop in share price. Pat was quite public in the past that the foundry is not yet profitable, and will not be for a few years until they're done with 5 nodes in 4 years (2025) and get a bunch of significant customers (tack on 1-2 more years). Still, I guess Wall Street wasn't paying attention and pretended to be surprised at the financials when they were revealed. To me, publicizing those numbers was a brilliant idea. It was clear transparency. What's more, it gave a number people in the company could now treat as a target. Prior to that, no one, including the CFO, had separated out the fab's financials to see just how unprofitable it is. Pat got punished for this one bad move. The crazy thing is, everything is going as planned! 5 nodes in 4 years is on track. The board bought into the plan when they hired him. They knew it was risky and expensive. They knew they were betting the whole company on this approach. And now, before the 4 years is over, they've chickened out. To add insult to injury, Intel is coming out making statements that the overall plan to become a strong foundry is still intact. For the most part, they will continue on with the strategy Pat has put in place. They're essentially trying to blame him (which may be legitimate), but get the glory if it turns out successful. Pat focused on improving the engineering, and less on the financials. His sales pitch was "Get the company back on engineering excellence, before trying to improve the financials." He stopped stock buybacks soon after he joined. He eventually convinced the board to cut the huge dividends down to the industry average. He improved the employees' total compensation significantly (again, it required him to convince the board).
- bornfreddy 2y ago
  Do you think appointing Maurice and Sanghi as new board members [0] will make a difference? I must say Pat Gelsinger was the only reason I believed Intel would make a comeback... Without him at the helm I'm afraid the bean counters will run the company to the ground. [0] https://seekingalpha.com/news/4365859-intel-appoints-former-asml-exec-meurice-microchip-chair-sanghi-to-its-boaard https://seekingalpha.com/news/4365859-intel-appoints-former-...
  - BeetleB 2y ago
    No idea. > I must say Pat Gelsinger was the only reason I believed Intel would make a comeback... I honestly don't know if he was doing the right thing or not, or whether he should or shouldn't have been fired. What's sad, though, is that if he had succeeded, this would have been a fantastic narrative. Pat joined Intel before its heyday, significantly helped it become a great company. He was then ousted and the company lost its way, and they finally turned to him to restore its glory and bring the company back to its engineering roots. It would be a fantastic way to end his own career as well. His personality is part of the narrative. He gave a talk some years prior to becoming the CEO - while he was still at VMWare. He spoke of how he felt he had won the lottery - by being able to join the workforce just before computers became big - at one of the key companies in the whole computing story. He felt it would be a wasted life if he didn't capitalize on that lottery win, and had made it his mission for much of his life to achieve as much as he could with that golden ticket and not waste it. It wasn't personal gain that made him work hard. It was to have an impactful life. He'd pretty much achieved all that by the time he got kicked out of Intel (at age 49). But bringing Intel back to leadership was an opportunity he couldn't pass up.

9 points by impish9208 2y ago

Gift link: https://www.wsj.com/tech/intel-ceo-pat-gelsinger-chips-bd4d61f9?st=vRcbME https://www.wsj.com/tech/intel-ceo-pat-gelsinger-chips-bd4d6...

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

not_your_vase 2y ago

What an uncharitable title... On the other hand of course, maybe just because someone is a genius when it comes to technical problems, doesn't mean that the same person is a genius when it comes to other, non-technical problems...

FrankWilhoit 2y ago

Gelsinger's plan depended on government subsidies and as such, it could not be Trump-proofed. Once you take government money, taking government money becomes the mission: cf. defense contractors.

Zigurd 2y ago
DoD work was always part of the foundry plan.
wmf 2y ago
IMO the subsidies are a small part of Intel's turnaround. The company needs to become fundamentally viable regardless of subsidies.

BeetleB 2y ago

Lots of problems with this article. Let's begin with: > In late October, the company reported its largest quarterly loss ever, a stunning $16.6 billion net loss that was especially surprising because Wall Street analysts had forecast a loss of $1.1 billion. The real loss is closer to $1.1B than $16.6B. The rest of it is a paper loss. Intel had announced layoffs, and was slated to give out generous severance and retirement packages. In addition, there were other restructuring costs and depreciating costs that were expected over time. The tax and accounting rules allow the company to claim those losses all at once - even if they've not been realized yet. > A series of manufacturing missteps clouded its long-term fortunes under CEO Brian Krzanich, who resigned in 2018 after having a relationship with an employee that violated company policy. No - he didn't resign. He was fired. And although the official reason was his relationship with an employee, that was merely a pretext to speed up the process. He was fired because of poor performance. And that affair started and ended prior to his becoming a CEO. The anti-fraternization policy came into effect in 2011, and he didn't end it immediately, but towards the end of that year. The board dug up that 7 year old infraction to find an excuse to fire him. And finally, the article doesn't really show how he destroyed $150B of value. Much of that value would have been destroyed regardless, because the fabs were in poor shape, which is precisely what Pat aimed to fix. He just happened to join when the stock was at an all time high. At that time, and until recently, the fabs were way behind TSMC - so any products made at Intel fabs would not compete. The demand for PCs has dropped, and AMD was tiny enough that a minor absolute increase is seen as a large percentage increase. As an example, when demand dropped 25%, Intel's sales dropped 33%, and AMD accounted for the remaining 8%. But an 8% drop in Intel's sales is likely a 30-40% increase in AMDs. Intel's failures in the AI space (various companies bought, failed GPU attempts) is very real, though. But due to declining PC sales, the company was short on cash and had to choose: Continue with the foundry plans and put GPUs on the back burner or abandon the foundry plans. If PC sales hadn't declined, they may still be working on the GPU. Most of the value lost this year was because they publicized the foundry's financials. Personally, I was surprised at the sharp drop in share price. Pat was quite public in the past that the foundry is not yet profitable, and will not be for a few years until they're done with 5 nodes in 4 years (2025) and get a bunch of significant customers (tack on 1-2 more years). Still, I guess Wall Street wasn't paying attention and pretended to be surprised at the financials when they were revealed. To me, publicizing those numbers was a brilliant idea. It was clear transparency. What's more, it gave a number people in the company could now treat as a target. Prior to that, no one, including the CFO, had separated out the fab's financials to see just how unprofitable it is. Pat got punished for this one bad move. The crazy thing is, everything is going as planned! 5 nodes in 4 years is on track. The board bought into the plan when they hired him. They knew it was risky and expensive. They knew they were betting the whole company on this approach. And now, before the 4 years is over, they've chickened out. To add insult to injury, Intel is coming out making statements that the overall plan to become a strong foundry is still intact. For the most part, they will continue on with the strategy Pat has put in place. They're essentially trying to blame him (which may be legitimate), but get the glory if it turns out successful. Pat focused on improving the engineering, and less on the financials. His sales pitch was "Get the company back on engineering excellence, before trying to improve the financials." He stopped stock buybacks soon after he joined. He eventually convinced the board to cut the huge dividends down to the industry average. He improved the employees' total compensation significantly (again, it required him to convince the board).

bornfreddy 2y ago
Do you think appointing Maurice and Sanghi as new board members [0] will make a difference? I must say Pat Gelsinger was the only reason I believed Intel would make a comeback... Without him at the helm I'm afraid the bean counters will run the company to the ground. [0] https://seekingalpha.com/news/4365859-intel-appoints-former-asml-exec-meurice-microchip-chair-sanghi-to-its-boaard https://seekingalpha.com/news/4365859-intel-appoints-former-...
- BeetleB 2y ago
  No idea. > I must say Pat Gelsinger was the only reason I believed Intel would make a comeback... I honestly don't know if he was doing the right thing or not, or whether he should or shouldn't have been fired. What's sad, though, is that if he had succeeded, this would have been a fantastic narrative. Pat joined Intel before its heyday, significantly helped it become a great company. He was then ousted and the company lost its way, and they finally turned to him to restore its glory and bring the company back to its engineering roots. It would be a fantastic way to end his own career as well. His personality is part of the narrative. He gave a talk some years prior to becoming the CEO - while he was still at VMWare. He spoke of how he felt he had won the lottery - by being able to join the workforce just before computers became big - at one of the key companies in the whole computing story. He felt it would be a wasted life if he didn't capitalize on that lottery win, and had made it his mission for much of his life to achieve as much as he could with that golden ticket and not waste it. It wasn't personal gain that made him work hard. It was to have an impactful life. He'd pretty much achieved all that by the time he got kicked out of Intel (at age 49). But bringing Intel back to leadership was an opportunity he couldn't pass up.