News Intel principal engineer bemoans potential TSMC takeover, touts company's 18A tech advantage

[Admin]

Call on Intel management and the U.S. government to retain control over Intel Foundry.

Intel principal engineer bemoans potential TSMC takeover, touts company's 18A tech advantage : Read more

 

[Marlin1975]

"Intel is making significant advancements in semiconductor manufacturing"


Put up or shut up. Intel has been saying this for what now a decade?

 

[TerryLaze]

"Intel is making significant advancements in semiconductor manufacturing"


Put up or shut up. Intel has been saying this for what now a decade?

And they have been raking in the money for over a decade...what more do they have to put up?!
They are cutting edge enough for them to make huge amounts of money.
Even for their fabs, all they have to do is to provide good enough for a good price.
Being the leader is just bragging rights on top of everything else.

 

[rluker5]

Buy low, sell high.
Remember when Intel squandered their process lead by sticking with DUV?
That is TSMC right now.

 

[dalek1234]

"Intel is making significant advancements in semiconductor manufacturing"


Put up or shut up. Intel has been saying this for what now a decade?

Intel like to make these grandiose statements, but the reality ends up being just the opposite. Not many listen to what Intel says these days. We've been burnt too many times.

I'm suspecting that this engineer's opinion is a lie he created to make Intel look desirable from outside, to make Intel worth more to any external "buyers". He just paints too rosy of a picture. Cloud 9 stuff.

 

[bit_user]

"Intel is making significant advancements in semiconductor manufacturing"

Put up or shut up. Intel has been saying this for what now a decade?

Intel 7 finally showed the potential of Intel's 10 nm-class technology.

Intel 3 is a clear advancement over Intel 7 and seems to be maturing well. I just wish we could've had the same chip on Intel 3 and TSMC N3B, in order to make a proper comparison.

The real test will be 18A, which should become more clear when Panther Lake launches, later this year.

In summary, in spite of their extensive delays and various missteps, it's clear that Intel is executing and making real progress. At this point, the key questions are whether 18A will arrive on time and live up to its billing.

 

[bit_user]

Intel like to make these grandiose statements, but the reality ends up being just the opposite. Not many listen to what Intel says these days. We've been burnt too many times.

Fair.

I'm suspecting that this engineer's opinion is a lie he created to make Intel look desirable from outside, to make Intel worth more to any external "buyers". He just paints too rosy of a picture. Cloud 9 stuff.

I disagree, but there definitely can be a situation where "group think" occurs and the insiders all drink the kool aid.

I'm not sure that's happening, here. The only way we can be sure is to wait and see (assuming nobody does anything that kills 18A in the cradle).

 

[spiketheaardvark]

I cannot imagine a situation where any US administration (even in our current state of crazy) would hand a foreign company a monopoly in something as important as leading edge semiconductor manufacturing. Global foundries maybe, TSMC never happening.

 

[Pierce2623]

"Intel is making significant advancements in semiconductor manufacturing"


Put up or shut up. Intel has been saying this for what now a decade?

Honestly, there’s not a single analyst out there who doesn’t think 18a will gain a clear performance victory over TSMC n2.

 

[Gururu]

I think the only thing TSMC can show Intel how to do is to whip its employees into shape for pennies on the dollar.

 

[Gururu]

Honestly, there’s not a single analyst out there who doesn’t think 18a will gain a clear performance victory over TSMC n2.

double negative, meaning unclear.

 

[nogaard777]

"Intel is making significant advancements in semiconductor manufacturing"


Put up or shut up. Intel has been saying this for what now a decade?

It's funny hearing this doom and gloom. Intel foundries has been behind for several years and clowns forget that they dominated TSMC for 3 decades. TSMC might be in the lead right now with what's in mass production, but Intel is absolutely in the lead with R&D with their new nodes.

This engineer's concerns are valid when TSMC moved to EUV well after Intel and EUV is insanely expensive. Letting TSMC have full access to Intel foundries right now would be equivalent to letting Intel have access to TSMC in 2018.

 

[Gururu]

It's funny hearing this doom and gloom. Intel foundries has been behind for several years and clowns forget that they dominated TSMC for 3 decades. TSMC might be in the lead right now with what's in mass production, but Intel is absolutely in the lead with R&D with their new nodes.

This engineer's concerns are valid when TSMC moved to EUV well after Intel and EUV is insanely expensive. Letting TSMC have full access to Intel foundries right now would be equivalent to letting Intel have access to TSMC in 2018.

You do realize that Intel burned down their homes and ate their children right? Step into their shoes...

 

[bit_user]

It's funny hearing this doom and gloom. Intel foundries has been behind for several years and clowns forget that they dominated TSMC for 3 decades.

You conveniently overlook the era between 2019 and now, which should give anyone pause in presuming Intel's ability to execute to plan. Clearly, something happened to Intel, that should give everyone a healthy dose of skepticism when looking at Intel's roadmap and plans.

In case you missed it, they recently announced another massive schedule slip in their Clearwater Forest server CPUs.

https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-com...sses-clearwater-forest-pushed-back-to-1h-2026
​

They cast the blame on packaging, and while there might be truth to that, it might also be true that they wouldn't have adequate yield or volume to deliver this year, anyhow.

TSMC might be in the lead right now with what's in mass production, but Intel is absolutely in the lead with R&D with their new nodes.

They were recently compared here:

https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-i...s-compared-intel-is-faster-but-tsmc-is-denser
​

Intel's advantage isn't quite so obvious to me. I think it depends a lot of the kind of chip you want to fab on it.

This engineer's concerns are valid when TSMC moved to EUV well after Intel and EUV is insanely expensive.

Huh? No, Intel was the laggard to EUV.

 

[dCasualGamer]

All the negative comments here are interesting. On 1 hand, people are cheering for competition and yet they also are all glooms about others prospect. I get it that Intel has stumbled on 10nm and has been trying to catch up since then, so I agree with the article - why give up all the progress right when the competition is starting to heat up

 

[smartcom5]

I'm suspecting that this engineer's opinion is a lie he created to make Intel look desirable from outside, to make Intel worth more to any external "buyers". He just paints too rosy of a picture. Cloud 9 stuff.

Truth be told, he's not even a engineer, never mind a principal!

Not to be that guy, but that Joseph Bonetti named, is surely not a Principal Engineer.

While he lists his title on LinkedIn as "Principal Engineering Program Manager" (which should be read as Principal Engineering-Program-Manager and explicitly not Principal Engineer!), his actual title is just Hardware Product Manager.

Intel does not even have a Principal role for program managers, and the standard required to reach Principal Engineer is extremely high, so it's very bad form to imply that without actually earning it.

So … @Admin can the news be changed and thus corrected please?

His take isn't wrong, but it shouldn't be amplified to the extent it is (which I assume is why it was deleted).

Source: Intel Engineer

 

[Gururu]

Truth be told, he's not even a engineer, never mind a principal!

Not to be that guy, but that Joseph Bonetti named, is surely not a Principal Engineer.

While he lists his title on LinkedIn as "Principal Engineering Program Manager" (which should be read as Principal Engineering-Program-Manager and explicitly not Principal Engineer!), his actual title is just Hardware Product Manager.

Intel does not even have a Principal role for program managers, and the standard required to reach Principal Engineer is extremely high, so it's very bad form to imply that without actually earning it.

So … @Admin can the news be changed and thus corrected please?

His take isn't wrong, but it shouldn't be amplified to the extent it is (which I assume is why it was deleted).

Source: Intel Engineer

He doesn't know what he is talking about. He only has a Ph.D. in Physics...

 

[bit_user]

Truth be told, he's not even a engineer, never mind a principal!

I caught that, but the article only had it in the headline. Anyone who reads it can see that he's not an engineer.

For those who don't know, a "Program Manager" is usually someone who sits in lots of meetings and tracks schedules to ensure things are moving along. They're usually an overseer without real authority. That said, I have no direct knowledge of Intel, but that's just my experience from other companies.

Not to be that guy, but that Joseph Bonetti named, is surely not a Principal Engineer.

While he lists his title on LinkedIn as "Principal Engineering Program Manager" (which should be read as Principal Engineering-Program-Manager and explicitly not Principal Engineer!), his actual title is just Hardware Product Manager.

Intel does not even have a Principal role for program managers, and the standard required to reach Principal Engineer is extremely high, so it's very bad form to imply that without actually earning it.

Thanks for the details!

 

[bit_user]

He doesn't know what he is talking about. He only has a Ph.D. in Physics...

LOL, you don't know the half of it.

A PhD in math or physics only guarantees that you know math or physics. It doesn't translate 1:1 to engineering. Not that there aren't plenty of excellent engineers with those degrees, but it's by no means automatic or guaranteed.

 

[Gururu]

LOL, you don't know the half of it.

A PhD in math or physics only guarantees that you know math or physics. It doesn't translate 1:1 to engineering. Not that there aren't plenty of excellent engineers with those degrees, but it's by no means automatic or guaranteed.

Point is, a very speculative picture is being drawn out of thin air about this person's role and responsibilities, no less from a biased view.

 

[Pierce2623]

Intel like to make these grandiose statements, but the reality ends up being just the opposite. Not many listen to what Intel says these days. We've been burnt too many times.

I'm suspecting that this engineer's opinion is a lie he created to make Intel look desirable from outside, to make Intel worth more to any external "buyers". He just paints too rosy of a picture. Cloud 9 stuff.

Every semiconductor analyst out there disagrees. 18

double negative, meaning unclear.

Nobody but you cares if it’s a double negative and the meaning is very clear. Analysts virtually all say 18a will outperform n2. Backside power delivery is expected to be a massive advantage and TSMC postponed their backside power delivery from n2 to A16. A16 in 2026 is the node Intel’s engineers need to be competing against instead of n2. Intel 14a was expected in late ‘27 when they still had a CEO pushing hard on the foundry side. Now it will probably slip to 1H ‘28 at earliest.

 

[phead128]

Intel engineer Product Manager deleted his LinkedIn post.

Most Product Managers have half-baked knowledge of the actual engineering process and are more marketing focused.

No actual Intel engineer with actual knowledge would tout their horn on LinkedIn, leave it to these marketing/business types that plunged Intel into the abyss.

 

[smartcom5]

This engineer manager's concerns are valid when TSMC moved to EUV well after Intel and EUV is insanely expensive.

Did we missed something? In what alternate time-line did that happen? Or is he talking about a fever-dream of his SecondLife-commune Intel inside™ of former Intel-employees and now outsiders?

At no point in time (we're talking about actual reality here) did Intel ever move to anything EUVL prior to TSMC.

Heck, up until 2021 Intel didn't even had anything with regards to today's EUVL-standards, when being finally delivered their EUVL-packages in 2021, even if that was sneakingly accounted for by 2019 already.

TSMC already moved to 7nm-class in 2017 with their N7 node, and by the turn of 2018 was well underway towards EUVL with 10 machines like the AMSL Twinscan NXE:3600D, starting into their EUV-first N7+.

 

[phead128]

The article's title should be updated to:

Intel Marketing Guy touts Intel's Horn on LinkedIn, then immediately Delete LinkedIn post after B.S. is called out.

 

[jp7189]

Pat set the expectation, and i believe rightfully so, that 18a is a make or break process. We're all holding our breath to see if Panther Lake will launch on time and on Intel 18a and with good enough yields to turn a profit. If all that comes true, then i think it's safe to say we have a race again. If 18a is a repeat of 20a, then I'd say they'll be looking to divest the fabs.

The thing is, we're close enough to Panther Lake that I imagine some internal people already have a pretty good idea of which it is.