SANTA CLARA, Calif., Dec. 2, 2024 – Intel Cor­po­ra­ti­on (NASDAQ: INTC) today announ­ced that CEO Pat Gel­sin­ger reti­red from the com­pa­ny after a distin­gu­is­hed 40-plus-year care­er and has step­ped down from the board of direc­tors, effec­ti­ve Dec. 1, 2024. 

Intel has named two seni­or lea­ders, David Zins­ner and Michel­le (MJ) John­s­ton Holt­haus, as inte­rim co-chief exe­cu­ti­ve offi­cers while the board of direc­tors con­ducts a search for a new CEO. Zins­ner is exe­cu­ti­ve vice pre­si­dent and chief finan­cial offi­cer, and Holt­haus has been appoin­ted to the new­ly crea­ted posi­ti­on of CEO of Intel Pro­ducts, a group that encom­pas­ses the company’s Cli­ent Com­pu­ting Group (CCG), Data Cen­ter and AI Group (DCAI) and Net­work and Edge Group (NEX). Frank Yea­ry, inde­pen­dent chair of the board of Intel, will beco­me inte­rim exe­cu­ti­ve chair during the peri­od of tran­si­ti­on. Intel Foundry lea­der­ship struc­tu­re remains unchanged.

The board has for­med a search com­mit­tee and will work dili­gent­ly and expe­di­tious­ly to find a per­ma­nent suc­ces­sor to Gelsinger.

Yea­ry said, “On behalf of the board, I want to thank Pat for his many years of ser­vice and dedi­ca­ti­on to Intel across a long care­er in tech­no­lo­gy lea­der­ship. Pat spent his for­ma­ti­ve years at Intel, then retur­ned at a cri­ti­cal time for the com­pa­ny in 2021. As a lea­der, Pat hel­ped launch and revi­ta­li­ze pro­cess manu­fac­tu­ring by inves­t­ing in sta­te-of-the-art semi­con­duc­tor manu­fac­tu­ring, while working tire­less­ly to dri­ve inno­va­ti­on throug­hout the company.”

Yea­ry con­tin­ued, “While we have made signi­fi­cant pro­gress in regai­ning manu­fac­tu­ring com­pe­ti­ti­ve­ness and buil­ding the capa­bi­li­ties to be a world-class foundry, we know that we have much more work to do at the com­pa­ny and are com­mit­ted to res­to­ring inves­tor con­fi­dence. As a board, we know first and fore­most that we must put our pro­duct group at the cen­ter of all we do. Our cus­to­mers demand this from us, and we will deli­ver for them. With MJ’s per­ma­nent ele­va­ti­on to CEO of Intel Pro­ducts along with her inte­rim co-CEO role of Intel, we are ensu­ring the pro­duct group will have the resour­ces nee­ded to deli­ver for our cus­to­mers. Ulti­m­ate­ly, retur­ning to pro­cess lea­der­ship is cen­tral to pro­duct lea­der­ship, and we will remain focu­sed on that mis­si­on while dri­ving grea­ter effi­ci­en­cy and impro­ved profitability.” 

Yea­ry con­cluded, “With Dave and MJ’s lea­der­ship, we will con­ti­nue to act with urgen­cy on our prio­ri­ties: sim­pli­fy­ing and streng­thening our pro­duct port­fo­lio and advan­cing our manu­fac­tu­ring and foundry capa­bi­li­ties while opti­mi­zing our ope­ra­ting expen­ses and capi­tal. We are working to crea­te a lea­ner, simp­ler, more agi­le Intel.”

Gel­sin­ger said, “Lea­ding Intel has been the honor of my life­time – this group of peo­p­le is among the best and the brigh­test in the busi­ness, and I’m hono­red to call each and every one a col­le­ague. Today is, of cour­se, bit­ters­weet as this com­pa­ny has been my life for the bulk of my working care­er. I can look back with pri­de at all that we have accom­plished tog­e­ther. It has been a chal­len­ging year for all of us as we have made tough but neces­sa­ry decis­i­ons to posi­ti­on Intel for the cur­rent mar­ket dyna­mics. I am fore­ver gra­teful for the many col­le­agues around the world who I have work­ed with as part of the Intel family.” 

Throug­hout Gelsinger’s ten­ure at Intel across a varie­ty of roles, he has dri­ven signi­fi­cant inno­va­ti­on and advan­ced not only the busi­ness but the broa­der glo­bal tech­no­lo­gy indus­try. A high­ly respec­ted lea­der and skil­led tech­no­lo­gist, he has play­ed an instru­men­tal role in focu­sing on inno­va­ti­on while also crea­ting a sen­se of urgen­cy throug­hout the orga­niza­ti­on. Gel­sin­ger began his care­er in 1979 at Intel, gro­wing at the com­pa­ny to even­tual­ly beco­me its first chief tech­no­lo­gy officer.

Zins­ner and Holt­haus said, “We are gra­teful for Pat’s com­mit­ment to Intel over the­se many years as well as his lea­der­ship. We will redou­ble our com­mit­ment to Intel Pro­ducts and mee­ting cus­to­mer needs. With our pro­duct and pro­cess lea­der­ship pro­gres­sing, we will be focu­sed on dri­ving returns on foundry investments.” 

Zins­ner has more than 25 years of finan­cial and ope­ra­tio­nal expe­ri­ence in semi­con­duc­tors, manu­fac­tu­ring and the tech­no­lo­gy indus­try. He joi­n­ed Intel in Janu­ary 2022 from Micron Tech­no­lo­gy Inc., whe­re he was exe­cu­ti­ve vice pre­si­dent and CFO. Zins­ner ser­ved in a varie­ty of other lea­der­ship roles ear­lier in his care­er, inclu­ding pre­si­dent and chief ope­ra­ting offi­cer at Affirm­ed Net­works and seni­or vice pre­si­dent of finan­ce and CFO at Ana­log Devices.

Holt­haus is a pro­ven gene­ral mana­ger and lea­der who began her care­er with Intel near­ly three deca­des ago. Pri­or to being named CEO of Intel Pro­ducts, she was exe­cu­ti­ve vice pre­si­dent and gene­ral mana­ger of CCG. Holt­haus has held a varie­ty of manage­ment and lea­der­ship roles at Intel, inclu­ding chief reve­nue offi­cer and gene­ral mana­ger of the Sales and Mar­ke­ting Group, and lead of glo­bal CCG sales.

For­ward-Loo­king Statements

This release con­ta­ins for­ward-loo­king state­ments that invol­ve a num­ber of risks and uncer­tain­ties. Words such as “acce­le­ra­te”, “achie­ve”, “aim”, “ambi­ti­ons”, “anti­ci­pa­te”, “belie­ve”, “com­mit­ted”, “con­ti­nue”, “could”, “desi­gned”, “esti­ma­te”, “expect”, “fore­cast”, “future”, “goals”, “grow”, “gui­dance”, “intend”, “likely”, “may”, “might”, “mile­sto­nes”, “next gene­ra­ti­on”, “objec­ti­ve”, “on track”, “oppor­tu­ni­ty”, “out­look”, “pen­ding”, “plan”, “posi­ti­on”, “pos­si­ble”, “poten­ti­al”, “pre­dict”, “pro­gress”, “ramp”, “road­map”, “seek”, “should”, “stri­ve”, “tar­gets”, “to be”, “upco­ming”, “will”, “would”, and varia­ti­ons of such words and simi­lar expres­si­ons are inten­ded to iden­ti­fy such for­ward-loo­king state­ments, which may include state­ments regarding:

 

• our busi­ness plans and stra­tegy and anti­ci­pa­ted bene­fits the­re from;
• pro­jec­tions of our future performance;
• pro­jec­ted cos­ts and yield trends;
• future cash requi­re­ments, the avai­la­bi­li­ty, uses, suf­fi­ci­en­cy, and cost of capi­tal resour­ces, and sources of fun­ding, inclu­ding for future capi­tal and R&D invest­ments and for returns to stock­hol­ders, such as stock repurcha­ses and divi­dends, and cre­dit ratings expectations;
• future pro­ducts, ser­vices, and tech­no­lo­gies, and the expec­ted goals, time­line, ramps, pro­gress, avai­la­bi­li­ty, pro­duc­tion, regu­la­ti­on, and bene­fits of such pro­ducts, ser­vices, and tech­no­lo­gies, inclu­ding future pro­cess nodes and pack­a­ging tech­no­lo­gy, pro­duct road­maps, sche­du­les, future pro­duct archi­tec­tures, expec­ta­ti­ons regar­ding pro­cess per­for­mance, per-watt pari­ty, and metrics, and expec­ta­ti­ons regar­ding pro­duct and pro­cess leadership;
• invest­ment plans and impacts of invest­ment plans, inclu­ding in the U.S. and abroad;
• inter­nal and exter­nal manu­fac­tu­ring plans, inclu­ding future inter­nal manu­fac­tu­ring volu­mes, manu­fac­tu­ring expan­si­on plans and the finan­cing the­r­e­for, and exter­nal foundry usage;
• future pro­duc­tion capa­ci­ty and pro­duct supply;
• sup­p­ly expec­ta­ti­ons, inclu­ding regar­ding cons­traints, limi­ta­ti­ons, pri­cing, and indus­try shortages;
• plans and goals rela­ted to Intel’s foundry busi­ness, inclu­ding with respect to anti­ci­pa­ted cus­to­mers, future manu­fac­tu­ring capa­ci­ty and ser­vice, tech­no­lo­gy, and IP offerings;
• plans and goals rela­ted to Intel’s pro­duct business;
• expec­ted timing and impact of acqui­si­ti­ons, dives­ti­tures, and other signi­fi­cant tran­sac­tions, inclu­ding the sale of our NAND memo­ry business;
• expec­ted com­ple­ti­on and impacts of res­truc­tu­ring acti­vi­ties and cost-saving or effi­ci­en­cy initiatives;
• future social and envi­ron­men­tal per­for­mance goals, mea­su­res, stra­te­gies, and results;
• our anti­ci­pa­ted growth, future mar­ket share, and trends in our busi­nesses and operations;
• pro­jec­ted growth and trends in mar­kets rele­vant to our businesses;
• anti­ci­pa­ted trends and impacts rela­ted to indus­try com­po­nent, sub­stra­te, and foundry capa­ci­ty uti­liza­ti­on, shorta­ges, and constraints;
• expec­ta­ti­ons regar­ding govern­ment incentives;
• future tech­no­lo­gy trends and deve­lo­p­ments, such as AI;
• future macro envi­ron­men­tal and eco­no­mic conditions;
• geo­po­li­ti­cal ten­si­ons and con­flicts and their poten­ti­al impact on our business;
• tax- and accoun­ting-rela­ted expectations;
• expec­ta­ti­ons regar­ding our rela­ti­onships with cer­tain sanc­tion­ed par­ties; and
• other cha­rac­te­riza­ti­ons of future events or circumstances.

 

Such state­ments invol­ve many risks and uncer­tain­ties that could cau­se our actu­al results to dif­fer mate­ri­al­ly from tho­se expres­sed or impli­ed, inclu­ding tho­se asso­cia­ted with:

 

• the high level of com­pe­ti­ti­on and rapid tech­no­lo­gi­cal chan­ge in our industry;
• the signi­fi­cant long-term and inher­ent­ly ris­ky invest­ments we are making in R&D and manu­fac­tu­ring faci­li­ties that may not rea­li­ze a favorable return;
• the com­ple­xi­ties and uncer­tain­ties in deve­lo­ping and imple­men­ting new semi­con­duc­tor pro­ducts and manu­fac­tu­ring pro­cess technologies;
• our abili­ty to time and sca­le our capi­tal invest­ments appro­pria­te­ly and suc­cessful­ly secu­re favorable alter­na­ti­ve finan­cing arran­ge­ments and govern­ment grants;
• imple­men­ting new busi­ness stra­te­gies and inves­t­ing in new busi­nesses and technologies;
• chan­ges in demand for our products;
• macroe­co­no­mic con­di­ti­ons and geo­po­li­ti­cal ten­si­ons and con­flicts, inclu­ding geo­po­li­ti­cal and trade ten­si­ons bet­ween the US and Chi­na, the impacts of Russia’s war on Ukrai­ne, ten­si­ons and con­flict affec­ting Isra­el and the Midd­le East, and rising ten­si­ons bet­ween main­land Chi­na and Taiwan;
• the evol­ving mar­ket for pro­ducts with AI capabilities;
• our com­plex glo­bal sup­p­ly chain, inclu­ding from dis­rup­ti­ons, delays, trade ten­si­ons and con­flicts, or shortages;
• pro­duct defects, erra­ta and other pro­duct issues, par­ti­cu­lar­ly as we deve­lop next-gene­ra­ti­on pro­ducts and imple­ment next-gene­ra­ti­on manu­fac­tu­ring pro­cess technologies;
• poten­ti­al secu­ri­ty vul­nerabi­li­ties in our products;
• incre­asing and evol­ving cyber­se­cu­ri­ty thre­ats and pri­va­cy risks;
• IP risks inclu­ding rela­ted liti­ga­ti­on and regu­la­to­ry proceedings;
• the need to attract, retain, and moti­va­te key talent;
• dis­rup­ti­ons to our busi­ness, inclu­ding our reten­ti­on efforts and rela­ti­onships with cus­to­mers, dis­tri­bu­tors and sup­pli­ers, due to the chan­ges in our seni­or management;
• stra­te­gic tran­sac­tions and investments;
• sales-rela­ted risks, inclu­ding cus­to­mer con­cen­tra­ti­on and the use of dis­tri­bu­tors and other third parties;
• our signi­fi­cant­ly redu­ced return of capi­tal in recent years;
• our debt obli­ga­ti­ons and our abili­ty to access sources of capital;
• com­plex and evol­ving laws and regu­la­ti­ons across many jurisdictions;
• fluc­tua­tions in cur­ren­cy exch­an­ge rates;
• chan­ges in our effec­ti­ve tax rate;
• cata­stro­phic events;
• envi­ron­men­tal, health, safe­ty, and pro­duct regulations;
• our initia­ti­ves and new legal requi­re­ments with respect to cor­po­ra­te respon­si­bi­li­ty mat­ters; and
• other risks and uncer­tain­ties descri­bed in this release, our 2023 Form 10‑K, and our other filings with the SEC.

 

Given the­se risks and uncer­tain­ties, rea­ders are cau­tio­ned not to place undue reli­ance on such for­ward-loo­king state­ments. Rea­ders are urged to careful­ly review and con­sider the various dis­clo­sures made in this release and in other docu­ments we file from time to time with the SEC that dis­c­lo­se risks and uncer­tain­ties that may affect our business.

The for­ward-loo­king state­ments in this release are based on management’s expec­ta­ti­ons as of the date of this release, unless an ear­lier date is spe­ci­fied, inclu­ding expec­ta­ti­ons based on third-par­ty infor­ma­ti­on and pro­jec­tions that manage­ment belie­ves to be repu­ta­ble. We do not under­ta­ke, and express­ly dis­cla­im any duty, to update such state­ments, whe­ther as a result of new infor­ma­ti­on, new deve­lo­p­ments, or other­wi­se, except to the ext­ent that dis­clo­sure may be requi­red by law.