Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by janrinok on Tuesday August 02 2022, @06:37AM   Printer-friendly

Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

With the COVID spending spree on PCs at an end and consumers spooked by the economy, Intel's profit and revenue plunged in the second quarter, the chipmaker said Thursday. Intel's own problems, like delays in data center chip upgrades, also were a major factor.

Analysts were appalled. "Intel's Q2 takes the prize for the worst we have seen in our career," Bernstein analyst Stacy Rasgon said in a research note Friday.

[...] "For decades, Intel was able to cover up a litany of failed projects, poor acquisitions, and strategic foibles by pushing Moore's Law and process leadership," he said. "Unless they regain this leadership (we think unlikely), or change strategic direction, we expect growth, profitability, and cash flow problems to persist at Intel."

The results show how hard it will be for Intel to claw its way back to the cutting edge of chip manufacturing and lead the US semiconductor industry to reclaim clout lost to Asia. Intel's near-term problems pose real risks to its long-term plans.

[...] Revenue dropped 17% to $15.3 billion in the second quarter, and Intel's profit of 29 cents per share, excluding some charges like stock-based pay and inventory write-downs, was a 76% decrease compared with the same period a year earlier. Both results were well below Intel's own forecasts and analyst expectations. Including those charges, Intel posted a loss of $454 million.

[...] Intel's "long term targets remain outlandish," Rasgon said in a research note earlier this week, which downgraded his expectations for the chipmaker's prospects. "Frankly, anyone owning the stock is not there for the near term...but rather strapping into a 5+ year nebulous story that is just barely getting started."


Original Submission

This discussion was created by janrinok (52) for logged-in users only, but now has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
(1)
  • (Score: -1, Spam) by GearsPlanetary on Tuesday August 02 2022, @08:17AM

    by GearsPlanetary (17878) on Tuesday August 02 2022, @08:17AM (#1264446)

    No message. Janrinok does not give me time to think, before he bans my account.

  • (Score: -1, Spam) by MondranialCortex on Tuesday August 02 2022, @08:33AM (6 children)

    by MondranialCortex (17881) on Tuesday August 02 2022, @08:33AM (#1264447)

    If only janrinok let me keep one account, just one, but, no, . . . .

    • (Score: -1, Spam) by MondranialCortex on Tuesday August 02 2022, @08:35AM

      by MondranialCortex (17881) on Tuesday August 02 2022, @08:35AM (#1264448)

      Aiming for 18,000 Soylentils! Most of them banned or inactive accounts.

    • (Score: 4, Informative) by janrinok on Tuesday August 02 2022, @09:53AM (4 children)

      by janrinok (52) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday August 02 2022, @09:53AM (#1264459) Journal

      Which one of today's new accounts (8 so far) was the one that you wanted to use as a new, reformed identity?

      They all behave exactly the same way. They either race to post as AC to insult or criticise one of your usual targets, or they try to build karma by making entirely spurious comments under their new username. There is nothing 'reformed' about any of them.

      If we can identify them as your true identity then so can everyone else. That identity is banned. If you create a new identity then we shouldn't be able to detect it, should we? If it behaves and does not return to old habits then we will never have any reason to ban it will we? The problem isn't at this end - it is one of your own making and you are doing nothing to resolve it.

      You want to dictate your terms for participating in this site. No, that will not happen.

      • (Score: 4, Funny) by Kell on Tuesday August 02 2022, @11:05AM (3 children)

        by Kell (292) on Tuesday August 02 2022, @11:05AM (#1264467)

        Seriously, you'd think they'd take up a more interesting hobby, like stamp collecting or some shit.

        --
        Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
        • (Score: 5, Funny) by janrinok on Tuesday August 02 2022, @11:41AM

          by janrinok (52) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday August 02 2022, @11:41AM (#1264474) Journal

          Unfortunately, he seems to have chosen the 'some shit' option.

        • (Score: 3, Informative) by Freeman on Tuesday August 02 2022, @03:03PM (1 child)

          by Freeman (732) on Tuesday August 02 2022, @03:03PM (#1264533) Journal

          This is the definition of psychopathy. Would be nice, if they got help. Though, maybe we're doing some kindly grandma a service by keeping their attention here.

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy [wikipedia.org]

          Psychopathy, sometimes considered synonymous with sociopathy, is characterized by persistent antisocial behavior, impaired empathy and remorse, and bold, disinhibited, and egotistical traits.[1][2][3] Different conceptions of psychopathy have been used throughout history that are only partly overlapping and may sometimes be contradictory.[4]

          --
          Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
          • (Score: 2) by Gaaark on Wednesday August 03 2022, @08:01PM

            by Gaaark (41) on Wednesday August 03 2022, @08:01PM (#1264835) Journal

            Ari's a Gramma! :)

            --
            --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 02 2022, @08:51AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 02 2022, @08:51AM (#1264452)

    Not being able to trust the manufacturer of hardware one uses is.. awful.

    Last Intel CPU i bought, was in 2013.
    It is an okay CPU (an i3), but... it's hard to like anything, that has an unremovable enemy agent inside it.

    I look at the box its mounted in, and i don't see my property.
    I see property of American Federal Empire, that can be taken over by some spook with correct keys whenever.

    That is why, Dear Intel, you can keep your "secret" "debug" interfaces, encrypted firmware within encrypted firmware and all the many negative rings below ring0 for yourself.

    • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 02 2022, @04:07PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 02 2022, @04:07PM (#1264561)

      Nobody cares that you exist, schizo.

  • (Score: 1) by shrewdsheep on Tuesday August 02 2022, @11:24AM (2 children)

    by shrewdsheep (5215) on Tuesday August 02 2022, @11:24AM (#1264471)

    Seems like Intel is in for a longer period of playing catch-up. Despite the serendipitous revenue gift due to Covid they couldn't get their act together. Might as well be they grew too big to survive.

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by bzipitidoo on Tuesday August 02 2022, @01:37PM

      by bzipitidoo (4388) on Tuesday August 02 2022, @01:37PM (#1264510) Journal

      There are also these new government incentives to spur chip making. How can Intel not benefit from that?

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by takyon on Tuesday August 02 2022, @02:06PM

      by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Tuesday August 02 2022, @02:06PM (#1264519) Journal

      Throwing money at their problems hasn't helped. Just look at the awful "10nm" delays, closure of its Optane memory business this week [anandtech.com], and failure to create GPU drivers worth a damn for their Alchemist launch. Despite having DG1 as a beta product and bragging about being the top graphics vendor because of all those hundreds of millions of iGPUs.

      On the other hand, their foundry business for third parties could become a money printer, especially if Taiwan gets seized. Too big to fail indeed.

      --
      [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by sjames on Tuesday August 02 2022, @02:19PM (4 children)

    by sjames (2882) on Tuesday August 02 2022, @02:19PM (#1264523) Journal

    Intel have been stuck on themselves for decades. They demand high margins for no other reason than that they are Intel. When AMD started providing real competition, Intel responded with dirty tricks including rigging their compiler to sandbag AMD processors and back room deals to make sure benchmarks were compiled with that compiler.

    They pushed Itanic way longer than they should have. When it proved to be a pig, they tried to strap JATOs on it. In the process they killed several decent existing 64 bit processors through more back room deals. x86_64 may not be ideal, but it's a good thing AMD came out with it and cut Itanic off at the knees. Adding insult to injury, Intel wanted several thousand for an Itanic in an era where complete systems could be had for $1000.

    Perhaps less well known, Intel data sheets lie. Not necessarily about specs or performance, but about things like how to init the memory controller. They apparently do it to force anyone wanting to develop low level firmware to pay through the nose for special access.

    That's all before they came up with the management engine. ME could be a technical win, but Intel jealously guards and access to it to make sure it's a loss for everyone but Intel.

    Note that none of this means I believe AMD to be anything like a paragon of virtue. They seem better than Intel, but there's a reason I like to keep myself up to date on ARM and RISC-V.

    Intel can theoretically survive all of this but to do so they'll have to see themselves more realistically and stop behaving as if they have the world by the short hairs. I'm not so sure their corporate culture allows for that.

    The funny thing about all of this is that they backed in to success with 8086 in the first place and had IBM not likewise backed in to success with their low priority PC (such a low priority that management didn't even care that all the tech specs were published and they outsourced the OS) they would be seen as an also-ran from the late '70s.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 02 2022, @02:27PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 02 2022, @02:27PM (#1264525)

      $50 billion tax dollars should help.

      KILL THE PORK!

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by bradley13 on Tuesday August 02 2022, @04:37PM (2 children)

      by bradley13 (3053) on Tuesday August 02 2022, @04:37PM (#1264578) Homepage Journal

      Exactly this. When Intel won the PC market, one really had to wonder. Motorola was a cleaner design, but was only taken on by Apple, a small player at the time. By far the best processor design at the time came from National. It limped along for a few years, but never won any big customers. Intel's x86 was a kludge, and still is.

      --
      Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
      • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday August 03 2022, @02:26PM (1 child)

        by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday August 03 2022, @02:26PM (#1264778) Journal

        The biggest value that Intel's processors have today is their ability to run legacy software.

        Lots of trans-sisters are wasted to support decades of obsolete cruft.

        Newer better instruction sets are the future.

        This is similar for Windows. The real value proposition of it is to run legacy software.

        For new software there are alternative OSes. Or Windows on alternative processor architectures.

        Gradually the legacy software will have less and less uptake. Applications that were compiled in the 90s and can't or won't be updated.

        And let's face it, a lot of what we do today is done in a browser.

        All of this makes the 'necessity' of both Intel x86/x64 and Windows less necessary.

        --
        People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 03 2022, @09:13PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 03 2022, @09:13PM (#1264841)

          The death of x86/x64 and the supposed superiority of these other instruction sets are greatly exaggerated. x86 is not going anywhere.

  • (Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 02 2022, @05:04PM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 02 2022, @05:04PM (#1264591)

    Revenue dropped 17% to $15.3 billion in the second quarter, and Intel's profit of 29 cents per share, excluding some charges like stock-based pay and inventory write-downs, was a 76% decrease compared with the same period a year earlier. Both results were well below Intel's own forecasts and analyst expectations. Including those charges, Intel posted a loss of $454 million.

    I need an MBA to help me with understanding this. They're saying that PC sales shot up the last two years while everyone was sent home to work. Here they're talking about all these losses compared with the same period a year earlier. If those numbers were unexpectedly high a year ago, why would you compare this year's numbers to that? And what is the $454 million loss, is it they lost that much money this year (negative profit), or is that how much less they took in from the same point a year ago (and potentially still a profit, just not as big as they expected)?

    I had the same issue with the Netflix losing customers for the first time ever story, because similar questions applied there.

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by Mykl on Wednesday August 03 2022, @12:20AM

      by Mykl (1112) on Wednesday August 03 2022, @12:20AM (#1264701)

      Because, to an MBA, it's all about beating last quarter's numbers. Anything else is an excuse.

    • (Score: 2) by legont on Wednesday August 03 2022, @12:28AM

      by legont (4179) on Wednesday August 03 2022, @12:28AM (#1264703)

      It's simple, but you will not believe me.
      Intel did lose $454. However Wall Street types don't like this number as most companies loose all the time so they exclude so called one time expenses such as management stock bonuses and lost inventory.
      Subtracting that, Intel made 29c per share, which is 76% less than a year ago. Wall Street does not like this either so they typically ignore this number and go after revenue.
      Revenue dropped 17% too. Not as bad, but really disastrous for a tech company because they are supposed to grow. They should sell $100 bills for $98 like amazon infamously was advised to do. Why it's so bad? It's because they are already in debt which they could afford to pay only if revenue is growing. See, they already did this selling bills trick many years ago.

      --
      "Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
    • (Score: 3, Informative) by kazzie on Wednesday August 03 2022, @06:24AM

      by kazzie (5309) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday August 03 2022, @06:24AM (#1264739)

      Numbers are always compared to a year ago, that's standard practice.* Intel knew that last year was a bubble, and expected numbers to drop. The key detail is that the "results were well below Intel's own forecasts" , and lower than other people thought they would be.

      The rest of the article is quoting the size of the drops/losses, to make good copy. The story here is that forecasters guessed wrong, and reality is "so" much worse than expected. Though they think it's more impressive to quote the big losses than show how much worse than expected they were.

      *Similarly, inflation figures are released each month, but always reflect a rolling 12-month period. An 11% increase in house prices means this month means they've gone up that much since mid-2021, not since last month.

  • (Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Wednesday August 03 2022, @01:52AM

    by hendrikboom (1125) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday August 03 2022, @01:52AM (#1264720) Homepage Journal

    And still, every decent Linux laptop I see on the market has an Intel processor.
    Purism has diabled the management engine, but it's still doing Intel.

(1)