When Lip-Bu Tan took the helm of Intel in March 2025, the firm was in determined want of a turnaround.
For years, the Silicon Valley-based semiconductor pioneer had been struggling to take care of its market-leading place as a chipmaker, having misplaced floor to Nvidia, AMD and Qualcomm. Meanwhile, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) produces 90% of the world’s most superior chips, leaving little room for Intel’s own foundry to compete.
The issues plaguing Intel weren’t misplaced on Tan when he made his first public feedback in a quarterly earnings report. “There are areas we need to improve, and there are no quick fixes,” Tan stated in April 2025.
Tan, 66, a Malaysia-born govt who spent a dozen years at the helm of Cadence Design Systems, has principally saved a low profile since taking up at Intel. So, when Tan made a public keynote speech final week at Computex, an annual commerce present in Taipei that has grown in recognition as a result of of the AI growth, a packed crowd was on hand to listen to him discuss.
The crowd had probably gathered to be taught extra about Intel’s core product — the central processing unit, or CPU — a chip that acts as the mind of a pc. Those chips have powered laptops and servers for many years.
But CPUs are actually thought-about important to the AI race and have acquired renewed consideration, giving Intel a recent alternative for a rebirth.
“The CPU revival could save the company,” Dan Nystedt, vice chairman of Asia-based personal funding agency TriOrient, instructed NCS. “The majority of (Intel’s) business is CPUs.”
In an announcement to NCS, Intel stated Tan has been centered on execution and placing its prospects again at the heart of all the things it does. “With a stronger balance sheet now, a refreshed leadership team and a renewed focus on engineering discipline, Intel is positioned to capture the AI-driven growth opportunities in front of us,” the firm stated.
Intel’s turnaround could get a fortunate boost due to agentic AI, a brand new era of AI that may full duties on an individual’s behalf slightly than simply answering questions.
Graphics processing items (GPU), the sort of chips Nvidia specializes in, are perfect for coaching AI fashions. But CPUs are seeing a spike in demand as a result of they’re helpful for inference, the course of of placing educated AI fashions to work. Inference is vital to powering the new wave of AI brokers that corporations like OpenAI, Anthropic and Google are growing and deploying.
OpenClaw — which independently operates apps, net browsers and good dwelling home equipment based mostly on instructions customers ship through messaging apps like WhatsApp — is one of the hottest AI brokers right now.
“The CPU is now the conductor, and the GPU is the orchestra,” stated Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang in a keynote speech in Taipei this week forward of Computex. Nvidia introduced a significant push into CPUs throughout the convention, introducing a new chip for laptops and desktops and revealing that its Vera information heart CPU is now in full manufacturing.
Tan instructed reporters on the sidelines of Computex that many CEOs have been calling him asking for extra CPUs over the final month.
“That’s a huge opportunity for us,” Tan stated. “We really (got) excited.”
Analysts say the next demand for CPUs could give Intel a boost in gross sales over the subsequent few years if it will probably rapidly ramp up manufacturing and guarantee manufacturing high quality.
“We are very focused on supply, making sure that we can delight the customer,” Tan added.
Tan’s technique at Intel seems to be straight from his playbook at Cadence, the place he streamlined operations, invested closely in engineering, expanded the firm with strategic acquisitions and cultivated deep relationships with its shoppers.
Tan has laid off roughly 34% of Intel’s workforce and paused plans to broaden manufacturing amenities in Germany and Poland. He additionally flattened company paperwork, introduced in new expertise, shaped new partnerships, bought non-core enterprise property and redirected the firm’s focus again to its roots.
“At our heart, Intel is an engineering company,” Tan stated throughout his Computex keynote. “And that’s what I decided from Day 1 … I have all the engineering report to me.”
Tan has elevated the engineers and reduce center managers, permitting him to maintain tabs on Intel’s chip and AI enterprise extra instantly. He has sold Intel’s controlling stake in a subsidiary in alternate for liquidity and employed senior executives from Qualcomm and Arm to guide its information heart and AI enterprise divisions. Tan has additionally introduced in investments from Nvidia and Softbank, securing strategic backing and partnerships from influential gamers in the AI business.
“Tan has been trying to bring in more outside resources into Intel, so that the company has the time and space to not only adjust its chip-manufacturing process, but also bring in more clients to drive the production volume up,” Chiayang Yao, an analyst with Taiwanese market analysis agency Digitimes Research, instructed NCS.
Meanwhile, Intel has acquired a serving to hand from the Trump administration.
In August, the US authorities made an $8.9 billion funding in Intel’s inventory, roughly a ten% stake in the firm, to assist its ongoing efforts to broaden analysis and manufacturing amenities in the US, whereas making certain entry to a home advanced-chip provide chain for nationwide safety functions. Shares of Intel (INTC) have surged about 300% since then.
The settlement was half of an effort to assist boost semiconductor manufacturing in the US and cement the nation’s place as a frontrunner in the international chipmaking business, a key precedence of Trump’s second time period.
But Intel nonetheless faces main challenges, notably in its chip-manufacturing foundry enterprise, which has struggled so as to add extra shoppers and enhance manufacturing high quality, analysts stated.
Still, there was much-needed progress for an organization that languished for years.
“(Tan) has managed to stop the bleeding, getting the company from an intensive care unit to a general ward,” stated Yao.
NCS’s Clare Duffy and Lisa Eadicicco contributed to this report.