• Lip-Bu Tan has been named as Intel’s new chief executive officer, effective 18th March.
• He replaces Pat Gelsinger who retired from Intel last year.
• Lip-Bu Tan takes the position at a time when Intel’s market dominance has dipped significantly.

One could describe Intel as a ship lost at sea. For the last four years in a row, the company has seen its market share drop lower and lower. This as AMD has captured the hearts and motherboards of consumers and NVIDIA has a stranglehold on the AI market.

The company’s processors are no longer considered the gold standard for consumer applications and while Intel’s enterprise technology may still be something of a golden goose, the focus on GPUs for AI workloads hasn’t helped its cause. Yes, Intel is now a GPU maker but its tech isn’t going toe-to-toe with the stalwarts just yet.

It’s against this backdrop that news broke last year that Pat Gelsinger would be retiring and as a result, stepping down as Intel’s CEO. The company has been looking for a replacement since then and on Wednesday it announced Gelsinger’s successor in Lip-Bu Tan.

The incoming CEO has quite the CV. His most notable achievement was at Cadence Design Systems where he served as CEO from 2009 to 2021. Under his leadership, Cadence Design System’s stock price ballooned more than 3 200 percent. He is also a founding managing partner of Walden Catalyst Venture and he served on the board of directors at Credo Technology Group and Schneider Electric.

Tan is also highly educated holding a Bachelor of Science in physics from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, a Master of Science in nuclear engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an MBA from the University of San Francisco.

The task ahead is unenviable but Tan appears to be motivated to make Intel the colossus it once was.

“As I prepare to come on board, I believe we have a truly unique opportunity to remake our company at one of the most pivotal moments in its history,” Tan said in a letter to Intel’s workforce.

“That’s not to say it will be easy. It won’t be. But I am joining because I believe with every fiber of my being that we have what it takes to win. Intel plays an essential role in the technology ecosystem, both in the U.S. and around the world. And, together, I’m confident we can turn our business around,” he added.

The incoming CEO says that he aims to make Intel an engineering-focused company, adding that it will listen intently to its customers.

“We cannot take anything for granted, and we will do regular deep dives to assess our progress. In areas where we have momentum, we need to double down and extend our advantage. In areas where we are behind the competition, we need to take calculated risks to disrupt and leapfrog. And in areas where our progress has been slower than expected, we need to find new ways to pick up the pace,” said Tan.

With Tan’s appointment, interim co-CEOs David Zinsner and Michelle Johnston Holthaus will assume other roles. Zinsner will stay on as executive vice president and chief financial officer while Holthaus will continue to be CEO of Intel Product.

Meanwhile Frank D. Yeary, who took on the role of interim executive chair of the board during the search for a new CEO, will revert to being the independent chair of the board.

“Lip-Bu is an exceptional leader whose technology industry expertise, deep relationships across the product and foundry ecosystems, and proven track record of creating shareholder value is exactly what Intel needs in its next CEO,” Yeary said in a statement. “Throughout his long and distinguished career, he has earned a reputation as an innovator who puts customers at the heart of everything he does, delivers differentiated solutions to win in the market and builds high-performance cultures to achieve success.”

As mentioned, the incoming CEO has an awfully tough job ahead of him. Not only have Intel’s latest processors left customers disappointed, they also had a tendency to crash if a bug allowed the CPU to draw more voltage than is safe.

It may be some time before we see Tan’s impact on the company but we’re sure he’s going to hit the ground running when he enters the office on 18th March.