{"id":30698,"date":"2020-11-16T16:13:53","date_gmt":"2020-11-16T21:13:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/?p=30698"},"modified":"2020-11-27T13:52:47","modified_gmt":"2020-11-27T18:52:47","slug":"intels-disruption-is-now-complete","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/2020\/11\/16\/intels-disruption-is-now-complete\/","title":{"rendered":"Intel’s Disruption Is Now Complete"},"content":{"rendered":"

James Allworth<\/a> (via Marcelo P. Lima<\/a>, Hacker News<\/a>):<\/p>\n

Indeed, that deal between Apple and Intel was more important for Intel than it could have ever possibly realized. But it wasn’t because Intel had sewn up the last of the desktop computer processor market. Instead, it was because Intel had just developed a relationship with a company that was thinking about what was coming next. And when Apple were figuring out how to power it — and by it, I’m talking about the iPhone — they came to their new partner, Intel, for first right of refusal to design the chips to do.<\/p>

[…]<\/p>

Here’s what Otellini decided to do, when presented with the option to power the iPhone:<\/p>

We ended up not winning it or passing on it, depending on how you want to view it. And the world would have been a lot different if we’d done it,” Otellini told me in a two-hour conversation during his last month at Intel. “The thing you have to remember is that this was before the iPhone was introduced and no one knew what the iPhone would do… At the end of the day, there was a chip that they were interested in that they wanted to pay a certain price for and not a nickel more and that price was below our forecasted cost. I couldn’t see it. It wasn’t one of these things you can make up on volume. And in hindsight, the forecasted cost was wrong and the volume was 100x what anyone thought.<\/p><\/blockquote>

[…]<\/p>

What about this chart is interesting? Well, it turns out, it bears a striking resemblance to one drawn before — actually, 25 years ago. Take a look at this chart drawn by Clayton Christensen, back in 1995 — in his very first article on disruptive innovation<\/a>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n

SoSoRoCoCo<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

As someone who worked on Intel’s phone chip: we definitely didn’t win it. We fucked it up twelve ways to Sunday. Why: giant egos. There were turf wars between Austin, Santa Clara and Israel over who would design it, and the team that won out had long since lost its best principle engineers and had no clue how to spin the architecture to meet the design win. Otellini’s hindsight hedge is pure spin: we knew the landing zone, we just didn’t know how to get there. And the aforementioned turf war guaranteed we didn’t get access to other teams’ talent. I’m bitter because it was a really fun team when I moved from Motorola to Intel Austin, and then it just corroded over political battles.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n

John Gruber<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

It remains to be seen if other ARM chip vendors will surpass the x86 platform in performance and<\/em> efficiency. But it’s starting to look like that’s inevitable — Apple is just far ahead of the pack.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n

Tony Fadell<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n