Intel-related networking card bit move

After missing the market for mobile devices, Intel is trying to reshape its once-things in the area of Internet of things.

At a recent Intel Information Technology Summit (Intel Developer Forum, "IDF"), Intel's Global CEO branch was greeted by a white shirt on a large screen with a virtual cartoon and a series of cartoon characters talking on a mobile phone He said there are 2.2 billion devices connected to the world at the moment, and 50 billion devices will be connected in 2020 years. This is also an opportunity for intel to rise again.

IDF was once the most High-profile event in the global scientific community. In the past few years, however, its glow has been overshadowed by Apple's new product launches over the same period. For Intel, the last encounter was probably in 1986, when people using PCs had no idea of the Intel brand or their CPUs. As a result, Intel launched the "Intel Inside" logo, and gradually built it into the PC industry's most powerful platform representative.

After missing the opportunity for tablets and smartphones, Intel set up a "new equipment" department last May, which has been carefully laying out the increasingly hot wearable market and the wider internet of things. In addition to building the size of the stamp of the wearable chip--edison, the awakening of the chip giants are brewing their own "platform blueprint." However, to achieve this goal, whether Intel can reshape its own organizational structure and business model as required by the new market becomes the key to success or failure.

Networking for the gathering of things

I have to say that Edison is one of the absolute protagonists of the current IDF, a chip module that is about the size of an ordinary stamp, and is designed for wearable devices by Intel.

In the past, Intel has sold billions of of chips by working with PC vendors, and as Intel's CEO, the company believes the wearable market will help Intel reinvent its glory. By 2020, he predicts, shipments of all kinds of networked equipment, such as wearable, will reach 50 billion. Internal data from Intel shows that about 85% of the world's equipment is still not interconnected, and the future trend is the internet of things, which means Intel has the opportunity to find opportunities on billions of devices.

Intel is actively looking for opportunities to collaborate with wearable equipment manufacturers and fashion brands. Division again to the presence of the media said.

On IDF, two young people from the Intel China Institute presented a wearable device based on the Edison chip to the global media, Edison the chip to compute and give instructions to the device, so that the clothes could change colors according to the mood of the human. In the IDF showroom, a variety of Edison-based new products emerge, such as placing the chip into beer barrels, toilets, rockets, drones, which are endowed with the functions of computing, storage, networking, and software, applications and services from Third-party providers.

Prior to that, Intel had announced a series of collaborative programs in wearable areas, including the introduction of Biosport headphones (detectable heart rate, pace, etc.) with SMS audio, and the fashion retail brand opening Ceremony and Barneys together to create $1000 worth of high-end smart bracelet mica, together with watches and accessories manufacturers fossil jointly develop smart watches and so on. These partners are not small, there is no shortage of American fashion industry's big name.

Did Intel, who missed out on the tablet opportunity, seize the opportunity to wear a wearable device? The answer is that Intel has a wide range of product lines and development tools that cover key growth segments, multiple operating systems, and different device configurations. Intel brings new business growth and product design flexibility to hardware and software developers.

Intel still chooses the platform strategy in the face of competition from technology giants such as Apple and Google in the wearable equipment market. Simply put, Intel does not build cars or make clothes, only chips. Apple makes its own TV and watches, and may make its own cars, even underwear, and anything that can be intelligent. Compared with the two modes, Intel mode is more likely to be embraced by industry partners such as apparel and automobiles, and to mobilize industry enthusiasm.

Intel, the head of the new equipment division, said Intel would continue to play the role of a platform manufacturer, and in short, Intel would prefer to focus on what it is good at, and then hand over hardware and fashion design links to better people. "We, even the Intel executives at the keynote address, do you think we're like the kind of people who can relate to fashion?" "The person in charge is teasing himself.

While it is difficult to estimate the market value of wearable equipment, it is certain that Intel is grasping at the breakout points in areas such as wearable equipment after missing the opportunity for tablets and smartphones.

How to beat Yourself

Like the IDF every year, Intel is still showing its strength in the chip sector. But the difference is that this time the Giants seem less conservative.

The project of the Internet of things looks more like an adventure. From the keynote speech, the reporter found that the Edison platform and the Internet of things were strangely placed at the top of the list, followed by the data center, which seems to indicate that Intel's future direction will focus on the domain of the internet of things. But in fact, Intel still needs to address the contradictions between future investment direction and real income.

Intel has told reporters that the Edison module is only slightly larger than an SD card or a regular stamp, using the 22-nanometer Intel Ling system chip (previously developed code-named Silvermont), including a dual-core, two-thread 500MHz CPU and a 32-bit 100MHz Quark MCU. At the CES show earlier this year, Intel showed the chip. In a meeting this April, Edison told our correspondent that Intel had made some adjustments to the unit, placing a dual-core processor in it.

However, perhaps because of the technical polishing, the price of this chip for ordinary manufacturers is not low cost.

According to the reporter understands, intel to the Edison module gives the official suggestion retail price is 50 dollars; the Intel Edison Toolkit for the Arduino platform recommends a retail price of USD 85 The Intel® Edison Expansion kit will be sold in 65 countries worldwide through Mouser and makershed by the end of 2014, with a proposed retail price of $60.

"The direction is right, but Intel faces a huge three-fee outlay, making the Edison platform priced at $50, while the ARM architecture's embedded solution is below $10 trillion, low to 2 dollars." "The industry has told reporters that this limits the development of its ecological environment, making its competitive future uncertain, if done purely high-end, the volume is not enough to support Intel's huge system."

"It's hard to imagine that a 1000-dollar bracelet will be widely available on the market, even if it's beautifully crafted," he said. said the industry personage.

Another embarrassing fact for Intel is that PCs remain Intel's cash cows for a very long time. According to Intel's earnings, the second-quarter revenue was $13.8 billion, and the PC sector was affected by the upgrade cycle, earning 8.7 billion dollars in the second quarter, up 6% per cent year-on-year. Intel still needs to prove itself on the move, as the revenue from the business in the second quarter was $51 million trillion, down 83% from a year earlier.

"The biggest challenge Intel is facing is that the traditional monopolistic position is shaken, the biggest challenge is to adjust to the lower gross margin of the new market, the higher product response speed (updated once a year, updated at its own pace, and slow in the new market). The insiders said.

(Responsible editor: Mengyishan)