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Technology Stocks : Intel Corporation (INTC) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: nihil who wrote (79487)	4/19/1999 8:20:00 AM
From: Process Boy	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 186894

nihil and Thread - INTC VP Sean Maloney Interview news.com EXCERPT: Q: A lot of analysts recently have pointed out that communications could be the next big thing for Intel. It could even dwarf the growth of processors. How will this whole networking and communication business begin to manifest itself as a substantial part of the Intel revenues and profits? A: The PC long ceased really being a computational device and really became a communications device. And obviously the Internet is what's speeding that up a hundred fold. PCs are primarily used for communications now. And so everything to do with Intel is now centered around the Internet and communications. Our client side development is really centered around optimizing the Internet experience. The server side stuff we do--the Pentium II Xeon and Pentium III Xeon, all of the development architectural work and planning is all based around how do you make better Internet servers. The whole server industry is going to be consumed by Internet issues within two years or three years. Q: This "PC is dead" issue: Do you see the PC declining in future years as a result of cell phones, Internet access devices, and the like? A: No, I don't. I think that what the computer industry has with the Internet is an almost infinite demand driver. You can make a case five years ago that every person should have a PC. You could make a case now that every room and every car should have some form or method of accessing the Internet. So the potential requirement for connectivity devices or computers has gone up dramatically as a consequence of the Internet. It's not all going to get serviced by PCs...I think you're going to see more and more simple messaging devices that interface to the Internet. You're probably going to start to see some very stripped down browser appliances over the next year or so. But I don't see them supplanting PCs, because the price of the PC has come down rapidly, the performance has carried on going through the roof, and there are now hundreds of millions of people who are used to using them and like using them. Q: What does this imply for Intel's business model? A number of these devices are going to cost less, so you will have to make more low-cost processors. A: I guess I would worry if we were anywhere near saturation. And as far as Internet access is concerned, we're only scratching the surface…I consider them a kind of upside potential. It would be very nice, for example, to have an Internet access device in the kitchen. Q: The "Intellifridge" A: Right. Let's say a screen that was in the kitchen where I could go and hit "epicurian.com," or at the same time I could look at my mail or I could look at my telephone messages. Am I going to want a keyboard and a mouse on that? No, not really, because I might end up tipping stuff on it. So a conventional PC in the kitchen is probably going to be a fairly unusual device. You're more likely to have just simple Web access devices there. On the other hand, in other rooms in the house I'm absolutely going to want a full-function PC. So I think that the market potential is large enough that you want to keep a very open mind about what these access devices would be. PB