Intel – Dull, but right

The floundering challenge of ARM reduces pressure for Intel to do anything radical.

• Intel has announced the appointment of Brian Krzanich as CEO of Intel following the retirement of Paul Otellini.
• Mr Krzanich has been COO since January 2012 and is a 30 year veteran of Intel having started in 1982 as an engineer in the New Mexico Fab.
• His speciality is chip manufacturing and he was mostly responsible for managing the move towards foundry business.
• Mr Krzanich has been chosen over a raft of external candidates most interesting of which was Sanjay Jha, ex-CEO Motorola Mobility and ex-COO Qualcomm.
• This choice speaks volumes about how things have changed in the last 12 months.
• In the last year, the threat to Intel has diminished markedly and to me this is what makes an internal candidate a dull, but correct choice.
• Firstly, ARM has made no meaningful impact into the computing market.
• In fact, so bad is Windows RT, that I expect most manufacturers to pull their offerings any time now.
• I think that the only hope for ARM in this space is complete harmonisation of Windows 8.
• What I mean by that is that from a user perspective there should be no difference when it comes to buying a Windows 8 device.
• It will take time for all the third party software to become compatible but there is no reason why the core of Windows 8 should be harmonised.
• The user’s choice should be made on performance, battery life and price alone and he should not have to worry about a locked desktop etc etc.
• The powers that be inform me that this will be very difficult to achieve, but until it is I firmly believe that ARM is going nowhere in this space.
• Secondly, Intel has improved.
• Its latest round of chips for mobile devices is actually pretty good.
• There are Intel powered mobile devices that run Android at $400 that compete effectively at that price range.
• While there is still a gap when it comes to power consumption, I think that Intel has gotten over the worst of its issues as its devices can now go from morning to night on a single charge.
• This is a key criterion as almost all smartphones need to be charged while the user sleeps if they are not to run out of juice the next day.
• Hence, I think that Intel is right to focus on manufacturing as its future as the pressure for a huge change in strategic direction has been lifted for the time being.
• Intel has its best friend Microsoft largely to thank for that.