Crossroads for Intel

pillageplunder writes "Businessweek offers a pretty balanced read on what challenges Intel faces in the upcoming year. Rivals Samsung and AMD are making inroads on Intels core businesses, an expected cyclical industry downturn looms next year, and with several critical delays in new (for Intel) markets puts its strategy at risk. A neat read."

Comments

Re:Cyclical downturn?

[erick99]

I've been on the marketing & sales side of computers for 21 years (started in Oct '83) and the only cycle I've ever been able to reliably predict is a slow down in corporate purchasing during the month of February. That does not necessarily relate at all to the semiconductor cycle, if there is one. I used to meet regularly with Intel marketing reps and they never mentioned a cycle. There may well be a longer term cycle, such as a four year or five year cycle where so many machines are bought at the beginning of a major product cycle such as the intro of the P4, for example. In that case, a lot of machines would come out of service starting at 2 years (leases) and out to five years (fully depreciated). This is all to be taken with a grain of sale of course - there are just too many variables (intervening and contravening).