Intel invested a huge amount of money, time and effort in getting its chips into mobile device, but it was all in vain. As according to DigiTimes, this year the chip maker is expected to sell even fewer chips than in past years.
Mobile segment still a problem
In 2015, only 10.8 million Intel-powered Android tablets will be within the reach of customers compared to 14.23 million last year, says the report. However, some growth is visible in handsets as Intel chips are expected to be in more than 10 million Android handsets this year. Though some positive is there in handsets for, the numbers appear very small if we consider data from IDC, which suggests that this year around 230 million tablets and phablets and another 1.447 billion smartphones will be made.
DigiTimes sees a ray of hope in increasing demand for two-in-one typo-slabs, however, which combine features of a PC and a tablet in one device. The website believes they could boost sales of Intel’s mobile CPUs up to 46 million a year, and this would be a great achievement by any measure.
As expected, the company’s mobile division is going into a trough. Despite its best engineering and ecosystem-building efforts, Intel is facing a drought of mobile device sales, and it seems that no improvement is expected in the near future. If Intel wants to sustain its market share supremacy over AMD, it needs to reveal its latest architectures on the most advanced manufacturing technologies as soon as possible.
Production delays hurting Intel
Intel initially planned to release Cannonlake, its next-generation 10-nanometer manufacturing technology, in 2016. However, a recent report from BenchLife claims that the chip maker has delayed it and that now Kaby Lake, another 14-nanometer processor, will be available for PCs in 2016. A different report from DigiTimes states that Intel is planning to postpone the Kaby Lake consumer variant launch from “early 2016” to September 2016, while enterprise-focused models will now launch in January 2017.
In 2013, Intel said it expects 10-nanometer manufacturing technology to ready for production by 2015. But now, it appears that the chip maker is facing issues producing this technology on a massive scale and in a cost-effective way.
