On the 23rd local time, the US chip giant Intel's financial report for the third quarter of this year showed that the company had successfully turned a profit, ending a six-quarter period of losses.This financial report is also the first quarterly report released after the US government's investment. Both revenue and net profit exceeded market expectations, with net profit reaching US$4.1 billion, a significant reversal from the US$16.6 billion net loss in the same period last year.After the news was announced, Intel's U.S. stock price soared by about 7.7% after hours, and its cumulative increase this year has exceeded 90%.
What investors are paying close attention to now is Intel's foundry business, which produces chips not only for Intel itself but also for other companies.The unit is expected to require about $100 billion in capital investment, but it has yet to win major customers.Intel's CEO also said that his top priority is to improve Intel's product line, cut costs, and attract more customers for the company's foundry business.
Some experts analyze from a macro perspective and believe that Intel’s outstanding financial performance this time is not due to its own stronger competitiveness, but due to the environment of the artificial intelligence boom.Although Intel's CPU chips, also known as central processing units, are not the core of AI training, the AI boom has driven the overall expansion of data centers.Graphics processors, that is, GPU computing clusters, still require coordination and support from CPU servers, which has led to a simultaneous increase in demand for traditional servers.
From the supply side, Intel's core process nodes have exposed production bottlenecks.David Zinsner, the company's chief financial officer, said that the tight production capacity of Intel 10 and Intel 7 nodes has affected the delivery of server and client processors, causing a phenomenon of "both volume and price" in the market.
Currently, the Intel 7 process is mainly used to produce the 13th and 14th generation Core processors, as well as the fourth and fifth generation Xeon chips, and to provide I/O modules for the upcoming sixth generation Xeon.As the gaming PC market's demand for 13/14-generation Cores increases, Intel faces conflicts in its production capacity allocation between consumer and enterprise products.Wafer fabs in Oregon and Arizona are operating at full capacity, and Raptor Lake processor prices have risen about 10% since September.In order to ease supply and demand pressure, Intel has adjusted its production priorities, putting data center products first, followed by the gaming market, while traditional PC processor production has been gradually compressed.
Nonetheless, the market remains optimistic about Intel's recovery prospects.After the U.S. government allocated approximately US$9 billion in exchange for approximately 10% of the company's equity, NVIDIA also announced an investment of US$5 billion in Intel, further boosting market confidence.Industry experts believe that Intel's challenge still lies in how to re-consolidate its industry position in the AI-driven competitive landscape by cutting costs, optimizing product lines and expanding its foundry customer base.
