Intel Corp. Needs to Be More Honest About Moore’s Law

[CharlieD]

<section class="usmf-new article-header"> <header>Did you see this one Dan?

"This Fool criticizes Intel management for not being as forthright as it could have been with investors about its chip manufacturing technology. Whenever I hold stock in a publicly traded company, I am aware that things can go wrong, even when that company has done its very best. Sometimes companies are subject to forces completely out of their control, and I completely understand that.
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What I find extremely distasteful is when a company's management team tries to paint an "overly rosy" picture of key aspects of its competitive positioning. This, I feel, is exactly what PC chip giant Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) has done, and continues to do, with respect to its public messaging around the competitiveness of its chip manufacturing technology."

(Stuff about Bill Holt not being truthful)

Intel needs to be more honest with its shareholders
I recognize it's Intel's job to maximize shareholder value, which means it needs to control its public messaging in such a way so as to make investors "feel" as though everything is going great and according to plan.

However, while keeping investors in the dark about the struggles it is facing might be good for the share price in the near term, the truth necessarily comes out -- it's just a question of when.

I think Intel needs to be as forthcoming as possible when it comes to these key aspects of its competitive positioning. Investors who are investing their hard-earned dollars deserve to know exactly what they're buying into."



I don't know who reads Motley Fool anymore but this one is being passed around work. Hopefully a meme is in the works.

 

[Daniel Nenni]

All very true. Intel is still working on transparency. Social media has really turned traditional MarCom strategies upside down. Those damn bloggers keep going back and researching what executives said and hold them accoutnable. And some of those bloggers have 30+ years semiconductor experience so you can't fool them with jargon. Ashraf did another one today which I also agree with, absolutely:

<section class="usmf-new article-header"> <header>Why Intel Corp.'s Altera Purchase Could Be a Huge Flop -- The Motley Fool
This Fool notes a couple of red flags in Intel's recent massive purchase of Altera

A deal looking at risk of failure
As an Intel shareholder, I would like to see the Altera acquisition play out as Intel hopes. However, with Xilinx and TSMC aggressively migrating to new chip manufacturing technologies, and with Intel's previous track record of integrating major third-party technologies into its own chips being, shall we say, less than stellar, it's tough to have confidence that the deal will create the value that Intel expects it to.
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[ippisl]

Daniel, why does it take intel so long to integrate infineon's tech into 14nm ? Is it mostly due to the difficulty of porting analog to 14nm finfet ?

And isn't the natural response(which is relatively easy to do) in such case is to do the analog content on a separate die , especially since this is for power optimized , not cost constrained designs ?

 

[Don Dingee]

"Mobile Unleashed", p. 205:

Intel is not famous for its transparency.

I can say from years of working with and around them, there is a lot Intel doesn't tell the public. They aren't real good at listening. They don't even really like their customers, especially when they start digging around in their roadmaps (which was a sport within Motorola engineering management).

I will say there is a difference between "not being truthful" and not telling everyone everything. I can assure you there is an engineering plan, somewhere, to fix whatever the perceived deficiencies in the Intel advanced process development are. Their PR machine probably doesn't even know what that is, sticking to their script.

As for integration of the RF modem, that is stumping a lot of people. Intel's EDA process and manufacturing rules are fabulously proprietary. Our story in "Mobile Unleashed" about Intel saying no thanks to 386 integration with Qualcomm modem IP circa 1997 - after shipping 6 million Qualcomm chips on a 186 - says a lot. Maybe the organization is still gunshy.

The fact is they are heavily siloed. There is a mainstream processor design team in Santa Clara, then there are outposts - Arizona, Singapore, Israel, Ireland - that take on the smaller, messier projects. Intel SoFIA is out of Singapore. Intel Curie is out of Ireland.

When Intel is ready with their 10nm process, you'll be the 106,701st person to know, give or take an updated employee count.

 

[Brianhayes]

The art or spin is to know how to leave an impression on the table without saying anything that can be called into quesrion.

 

[Tom Simon]

When Altera started using Intel as their foundry Intel had to provide enough information about the process technology for them to be able to tape out. But most of the tools and tech files came from Intel. The problem with Intel is that even groups within Intel are not given the actual stack up and electrical properties. So I am sure that Altera is getting more information about the process technology now; but inside or outside of Intel, tI am betting hey are not getting as much info as say a TSMC customer would get.

While keeping the crown jewels safe is important, you have to wonder how much the culture of secrecy has hurt Intel's efforts to become a commercial fab or its ability to integrate acquisitions.

 

[Daniel Nenni]

Ippisl,

Porting anything to an Intel process is difficult. People take TSMC's ability to accommodate many different designs for granted. But really it is an amazing act of collaboration built over the many years TSMC has been in business. Intel however is not a collaborative culture. The Intel process people build fans for Intel CPUs. Everything else takes a back seat. The Infineon and Alteration acquisitions are a glaring example of that. Where is the 14nm silicon? Intel Custom Foundry is another example.... No 14nm silicon.

D.A.N.

 

[Pawan Fangaria]

Intel still is the top IDM, and as I see it being secretive and non-collaborative has paid them well in IDM kind of business model. But today, in a fabless world where pure-play foundries are taking the forefront, collaboration is the reality. Intel realizes that reality but doesn't admit. They have to work hard on collaboration to change their perception of being solo, and also gain from this new business culture.

 

[Brianhayes]

I have been reading Ashraf Eassa for four years. When I started he was of huge value to me. He always writes pungently and references his sources well but then he had one other value. He was always wrong. I could establish that for myself by looking up and reading through all his references. His dominant themes were Intel will smash ARM and TSMC cannot hope to catch up. In fact I owe him my decision to put money into TSMC. Since leaving SA and joining the Motley Fool he has, alas, completely changed his tune.

This article is in a way rather sad and must have been difficult for him. It records, not so much Intel's spin to which he very rightly objects, but the vast amount of ground they have lost at 14nm. Ashraf has written a lucid statement of their Syracusan defeat.