Article Link –Intel Shows Off the Chip Tech That Will Power Your PC in 2025

Intel on Thursday showed a silicon wafer studded with chips built with a manufacturing process that’s set to arrive in 2025, a signal intended to reassure customers that the company’s years of chip manufacturing difficulties are behind it.

“We remain on or ahead of schedule against the timelines that we laid out,” Chief Executive Pat Gelsinger said of the company’s plan to improve manufacturing processes. He showed off a gleaming wafer of memory chips built with the company’s upcoming Intel 18A process, which overhauls the transistors at the heart of chip circuitry and the way power is delivered to them.

Intel is trying to dramatically accelerate manufacturing progress to meet a 2025 goal of reclaiming the chip performance lead it lost to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) and Samsung. If it succeeds, it’ll mean PC chips progress faster after a half decade of lackluster performance improvements. And it could mean Intel becomes more relevant to your digital life by building chips inside your car, phone and gaming PC graphics card.

Discussion Questions:

1. Identify three key takeaways from the article. What did you find most interesting?
2. What are the major changes Intel is making to their chips?
3. What changes to transistor technology will the chip inquorate? How does it work?

Source: Alison Stephen Shankland, “www.cnet.com” February 17, 2022.