> It simply doesn't make sense for them to be making high volume embedded chips unless they have excess fab capacity (which they don't).
Well they desperately want to do it anyway. Anyway by your very reasoning, they won't do high volume chips (you added embedded but it does not matter, you just can't reach the same volume as embedded chips with such higher prices). Whether they not reach that for a reason or another does not matter much; but the consequences of that fail could be hard. The desktop and server world is not going away, the x86 world also is here to stay, but there is no hard limit to the changes of market repartition that can happen even there. IBM is still very powerful with their mainframes, and Intel could follow that path for (a part of) desktops and servers, but the more they allow the ARM world to develop, the more their share is at risk on their own land in the long term.
The problem is that SoC offering not only matters now, but it even has mattered for several years, and Intel had no offering, sill has no serious one, and is probably not even going to have no serious one for several other years. For a company with such resources, this is crazy. And when you take a look at the press communicate to try to understand what they think that matter, you do not expect big changes:
"operations and the cost structure" i don't know enough to judge so i give it the benefit of the doubt, "breakthrough innovations" are real important stuff, so good point here; but:
- "Reinvented the PC with Ultrabook™ devices" <- is this a joke???
- "Greatly expanded business partnerships and made strategic acquisitions that expanded Intel’s presence in security, software and mobile communications" <- ok they are talking about Intel's McAfee and other stuffs that makes no sense here
- "Delivered the first smartphones and tablets for sale with Intel inside" <- okkkkk, so? huge fail here, and they do not even try to pretend they matter in this field, just that they exist, because they know they won't be forgiven if they don't. That's what we are talking about.
- "Grew the vast network of cloud-based computing built on Intel products" <- not driven by them. They could as well have talked about the internet and we servers, but the fashion word of the day is cloud, so they talked about that.
Intel, desktops and servers, are here to stay, we agree on that. But their market share is at risk, because these markets are not isolated island. Intel won't be able to increase their prices too much, so if their market decrease too much, do the maths.
Well they desperately want to do it anyway. Anyway by your very reasoning, they won't do high volume chips (you added embedded but it does not matter, you just can't reach the same volume as embedded chips with such higher prices). Whether they not reach that for a reason or another does not matter much; but the consequences of that fail could be hard. The desktop and server world is not going away, the x86 world also is here to stay, but there is no hard limit to the changes of market repartition that can happen even there. IBM is still very powerful with their mainframes, and Intel could follow that path for (a part of) desktops and servers, but the more they allow the ARM world to develop, the more their share is at risk on their own land in the long term.
The problem is that SoC offering not only matters now, but it even has mattered for several years, and Intel had no offering, sill has no serious one, and is probably not even going to have no serious one for several other years. For a company with such resources, this is crazy. And when you take a look at the press communicate to try to understand what they think that matter, you do not expect big changes: "operations and the cost structure" i don't know enough to judge so i give it the benefit of the doubt, "breakthrough innovations" are real important stuff, so good point here; but: - "Reinvented the PC with Ultrabook™ devices" <- is this a joke??? - "Greatly expanded business partnerships and made strategic acquisitions that expanded Intel’s presence in security, software and mobile communications" <- ok they are talking about Intel's McAfee and other stuffs that makes no sense here - "Delivered the first smartphones and tablets for sale with Intel inside" <- okkkkk, so? huge fail here, and they do not even try to pretend they matter in this field, just that they exist, because they know they won't be forgiven if they don't. That's what we are talking about. - "Grew the vast network of cloud-based computing built on Intel products" <- not driven by them. They could as well have talked about the internet and we servers, but the fashion word of the day is cloud, so they talked about that.
Intel, desktops and servers, are here to stay, we agree on that. But their market share is at risk, because these markets are not isolated island. Intel won't be able to increase their prices too much, so if their market decrease too much, do the maths.