INTC Commentator
Traded Value$Intel(INTC.US) So, the data center shortage has nothing to do with the 18A yield rate at all. Currently, the latest Intel 3 process from the Irish fab ships less than 20%, with another 40% still on the old 14nm process. How can the profit margin be good? No wonder the profit margin is far lower than AMD's. It turns out Intel is maintaining a 60% share of the server market by pushing low-end volume.
Hopefully, in 2026, the Xeon 6th generation from the Irish fab can ship in large volumes, and this quarter can bring the 18A version of Clearwater Forest to the table.
Intel‘s biggest server CPU opportunity is also the company’s biggest problem right now, and here‘s why:
Bernstein talks about the demand Intel faces for its enterprise CPU offerings (Q4 2025), and here’s how it is divided:
- Atom: 14%
- Cascade Lake: 25%
- Ice Lake: 5%
- Sapphire Rapids: 17%
- Emerald Rapids: 22%
- Sierra Forest: 7%
- Granite Rapids: 11%
If you don‘t realize the problem here, it is about how hyperscalers are looking towards solutions that are generations old, and this forces Intel to not only restructure production lines, but to shift attention towards nodes like Intel 7 and Intel 3, which are known as mature offerings.
The problem with ramping up production for mature nodes mainly in the form of poor ROI, confusion within production strategies and demand uncertainity. The reason why hyperscalers are opting for older generations is here due to the fact that customers are slow to migrate to newer solutions, and that for now, they are mostly being used for legacy workloads, and not actually what is required with agentic AI.
Intel has the necessary portfolio to cater to modern-day AI workloads as well, such as Clearwater Forest SKUs, but right now, the demand is centered around an outdated portfolio, and this has become a problem for the company.
The copyright of this article belongs to the original author/organization.
The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and do not reflect the stance of the platform. The content is intended for investment reference purposes only and shall not be considered as investment advice. Please contact us if you have any questions or suggestions regarding the content services provided by the platform.
