Die wachsende Wut bei PC-Herstellern, Einzelhändlern und Verbrauchern im Allgemeinen, über Probleme mit Intel-Prozessoren und steigende Preise veranlassten Bob Swan, CFO und Interim-CEO von Intel, einen offenen Brief an Kunden und Partner zu schreiben.
Dieser Brief erreichte nicht nur techpowerup, sondern auch andere Kunden über den Intel-News-Kanal. Die Fakten und Darstellungen in der E-Mail sind einfach wiedergegeben und wir würden sie nicht weiter interpretieren wollen. Intel ist mit einer Kombination aus einer massiven Nachfrage, sowohl seiner Cloud-Computing-Kunden als auch der PC-Hersteller und der Flut von Kunden, die ihre Systeme aufrüsten wollen, betroffen. Auch weil Intel 10 Jahre brauchte, um die Anzahl der CPU-Kerne zu erhöhen, um den Kunden einen Grund für ein Upgrade zu geben.
Um dies zu mildern, lässt Intel neben den wichtigsten Gießereien auch in Oregon, Arizona, Irland und Israel seine gesamten Produktionsanlagen, durch zusätzliche Investitionen in Höhe von 1 Milliarde US-Dollar (derzeit 15 Milliarden US-Dollar), die Produktivität in die Höhe schießen. Der Brief kommt nicht umhin, 10 nm zu erwähnen, sodass das Unternehmen Fortschritte bei den Erträgen macht und dass die Volumenproduktion 2019 eingeführt werden sollte (ohne Hinweise darauf, wann). Intel versucht die PC-OEMs zu beruhigen, indem Intel anmerkt, dass ihre Versorgungsteams in den nächsten Wochen in engerem Kontakt mit ihnen sein werden.
Ohne weitere Umschweife folgt der offene Brief wörtlich.
„To our customers and partners, The first half of this year showed remarkable growth for our industry. I want to take a moment to recap where we’ve been, offer our sincere thanks and acknowledge the work underway to support you with performance-leading Intel products to help you innovate.
First, the situation … The continued explosion of data and the need to process, store, analyze and share it is driving industry innovation and incredible demand for compute performance in the cloud, the network and the enterprise. In fact, our data-centric businesses grew 25 percent through June, and cloud revenue grew a whopping 43 percent in the first six months. The performance of our PC-centric business has been even more surprising.
Together as an industry, our products are convincing buyers it’s time to upgrade to a new PC. For example, second-quarter PC shipments grew globally for the first time in six years, according to Gartner. We now expect modest growth in the PC total addressable market (TAM) this year for the first time since 2011, driven by strong demand for gaming as well as commercial systems – a segment where you and your customers trust and count on Intel. We are thrilled that in an increasingly competitive market, you keep choosing Intel. Thank you.
Now for the challenge… The surprising return to PC TAM growth has put pressure on our factory network. We’re prioritizing the production of Intel Xeon and Intel Core processors so that collectively we can serve the high-performance segments of the market. That said, supply is undoubtedly tight, particularly at the entry-level of the PC market. We continue to believe we will have at least the supply to meet the full-year revenue outlook we announced in July, which was $4.5 billion higher than our January expectations.
To address this challenge, we’re taking the following actions:
We are investing a record $15 billion in capital expenditures in 2018, up approximately $1 billion from the beginning of the year. We’re putting that $1 billion into our 14 nm manufacturing sites in Oregon, Arizona, Ireland and Israel. This capital along with other efficiencies is increasing our supply to respond to your increased demand.
We’re making progress with 10 nm. Yields are improving and we continue to expect volume production in 2019.
We are taking a customer-first approach. We’re working with your teams to align demand with available supply. You can expect us to stay close, listen, partner and keep you informed.
The actions we are taking have put us on a path of continuous improvement. At the end of the day, we want to help you make great products and deliver strong business results. Many of you have been longtime Intel customers and partners, and you have seen us at our best when we are solving problems.
Sincerely, Bob Swan Intel Corporation CFO and Interim CEO „
