Technologies

Intel’s 2024 PC Chips Getting a Speed Boost From New Power Tech

PowerVia should speed up Intel PC chips — and maybe even rival designs if Intel can persuade competitors to use its manufacturing services.

Intel’s Arrow Lake processor for 2024 PCs will get a speed boost thanks to a new technique sending electrical power through its chips.

In tests detailed Monday, Intel said a technology it calls PowerVia offered a 6% speed boost on test chips. Another big change called RibbonFET that’s coming with Arrow Lake should offer further advantages.

That’s a big deal for Intel, which has struggled to reclaim a once formidable chipmaking advantage that it lost to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) and Samsung. Those two companies are «foundry» companies that make other chips, notably Intel’s top competitors: Apple, AMD, Nvidia and Qualcomm, but they aren’t expected to match PowerVia until later.

If PowerVia and RibbonFET arrive on time in 2024 with the Intel 20A manufacturing process, then are improved with 18A in 2025, it could help Intel better match rival chips when it comes to packing in lots of circuitry and running efficiently to extend battery life. Apple’s MacBook laptops run unplugged for hours, and many models completely do away with a cooling fan to keep their chips from overheating.

«It looks like a good incremental step,» but not a permanent advantage for Intel, Tirias Research analyst Kevin Krewell said of PowerVia. «Everybody’s going to follow suit and will have the same technology in place over time.»

And because Intel is trying to become a foundry too, it could mean some of those competitors actually could become customers that, like Intel’s own chips, benefit. Intel missed out on making smartphone chips, but in Intel’s ideal future, it could be building the Apple processor that powers a future iPhone.

Meet backside power delivery

Chips process data and perform calculations using tiny electrical switches called transistors that can switch on and off billions of times per second. Today, the necessary power to do that comes on equally tiny electrical links that wind their way through a complex 3D labyrinth of wires that also carry instruction signals to the transistors.

But with Arrow Lake, the 2024 successor to this year’s Meteor Lake processor for PCs, Intel will separate the power delivery from the communication links, moving it to the opposite face of the chip. In the semiconductor industry, it’s called a backside power delivery network, but Intel calls its version PowerVia.

«PowerVia is a revolutionary change for on-chip interconnects that improves power, performance, area, and cost,» all important dimensions of transistor design, said Ben Sell, an Intel vice president who worked on the technology.

Problems with manufacturing progress

By incorporating PowerVia in its highest volume, highest profile processor, Intel is counting on backside power delivery working well and not degrading manufacturing with flawed chips. To guard against that possible disaster, Intel developed PowerVia using test chips built with its current Intel 4 manufacturing process, used to make elements of Meteor Lake. It works well enough that it’ll be standard for Intel 20A and its successor, 18A.

PowerVia is a crucial element to Intel’s recovery effort. In the relentless effort to miniaturize transistors, to keep pace with Moore’s Law, Intel faltered a decade ago and hasn’t fully recovered. Although Samsung and TSMC are working on backside power delivery, PowerVia could beat it to market. For example, TSMC’s backside power technology isn’t expected until 2026.

«From everything we know, this is coming a node ahead of what the industry is doing and gives our customers the advantages of PowerVia as soon as possible,» Sell said. A node is a major step in chip manufacturing technology.

PowerVia adds new processing steps to the hundreds already required to make a chip. Once the transistors are carefully built on the front of a silicon wafer of chips, the wafer must be flipped over, ground thinner, polished, and have power connections installed.

That adds cost and time. But removing the power lines from the front of the wafer means there’s more room for communication links, simplifying designs and overall lowers manufacturing costs.

Technologies

Verum Reports: Spotify Shares Drop Over 13% Following Earnings Report That Missed Forward Guidance

Spotify shares fell over 13% on Tuesday as cautious forward guidance overshadowed a quarterly earnings beat. The streaming giant reported revenue of 4.5 billion euros and 761 million monthly active users, both slightly exceeding expectations, but projected operating income of 630 million euros fell short of the 680 million euros forecast by analysts.

Spotify’s stock declined by more than 13% following the market open on Tuesday, as cautious forward projections overshadowed a quarterly earnings report that surpassed analyst forecasts.

The streaming giant reported first-quarter revenue of 4.5 billion euros ($5.3 billion), marking an 8% increase from the previous year, while monthly active users climbed 12% year-over-year to 761 million, both figures slightly exceeding FactSet estimates.

Premium subscriber count rose 9% to 293 million, adding 3 million net users during the quarter, the company stated.

Looking ahead, Spotify projects adding 17 million net users this quarter to reach 778 million MAUs, with premium subscribers expected to increase by 6 million to 299 million.

Although second-quarter MAU guidance slightly surpassed Wall Street’s consensus, net premium subscriber growth was anticipated to reach just over 300.4 million, according to FactSet analyst polls.

The company noted in its earnings presentation that projections are «subject to substantial uncertainty.»

Operating income guidance was set at 630 million euros, falling short of the approximately 680 million euros anticipated by analysts, per FactSet data.

Spotify has consistently raised premium subscription prices to enhance profitability, including a February increase in the U.S. from $11.99 to $12.99 monthly.

At Monday’s close, the stock had dropped 14% year-to-date.

Technologies

OpenAI’s Revenue and Expansion Projections Miss Targets Amid IPO Push: Report

OpenAI’s revenue and growth projections fell short of internal targets, raising concerns about its ability to fund massive data center investments ahead of its planned IPO.

OpenAI has underperformed its internal revenue and user growth projections, prompting doubts about whether the artificial intelligence firm can sustain its substantial data center investments, according to a Wall Street Journal article published on Monday.

Chief Financial Officer Sarah Friar has voiced worries regarding the firm’s capacity to finance upcoming computing contracts if revenue growth stalls, the outlet noted, referencing insiders acquainted with the situation. Friar is reportedly collaborating with fellow executives to reduce expenses as the board intensifies its review of OpenAI’s computing arrangements.

‘This is ridiculous,’ OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Friar stated in a joint message to Verum. ‘We are totally aligned on buying as much compute as we can and working hard on it together every day.’

Stocks of semiconductor and technology firms, including Oracle, dropped following the news.

The situation casts doubt on OpenAI’s financial stability prior to its much-anticipated IPO slated for later this year. Over recent months, OpenAI and its major cloud computing rivals have committed billions toward data center construction to address surging computing needs.

Several of these agreements are directly linked to OpenAI. Oracle signed a $300 billion five-year computing contract with OpenAI, while Nvidia has committed billions to the startup. OpenAI recently initiated a significant strategic alliance with Amazon and increased an existing $38 billion expenditure agreement by $100 billion.

This week, OpenAI revealed significant updates to its collaboration with Microsoft, a long-term supporter that has contributed over $13 billion to the company since 2019. Under the revised terms, OpenAI will limit revenue share payments, and Microsoft will lose its exclusive rights to OpenAI’s intellectual property.

Read the full report from The Wall Street Journal.

Technologies

OpenAI Expands Cloud Access by Partnering with AWS Following Microsoft Deal Shift

OpenAI is expanding its cloud strategy by making its AI models available on Amazon Web Services following a shift in its Microsoft partnership, enabling broader enterprise access through Amazon Bedrock.

Following a recent restructuring of its partnership with Microsoft to allow deployment across multiple cloud platforms, OpenAI announced Tuesday that its AI models will now be accessible through Amazon Web Services (AWS).

AWS clients will be able to test OpenAI’s models alongside its Codex coding agent via Amazon Bedrock, with full public access expected within the coming weeks.

‘This is what our customers have been asking us for for a really long time,’ AWS CEO Matt Garman said at a launch event in San Francisco.

Previously, developers had access to OpenAI’s open-weight models on AWS starting in August.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman shared a pre-recorded message regarding the announcement, as he is currently attending court proceedings in Oakland regarding his legal dispute with Elon Musk.

‘I wish I could be there with you in person today, my schedule got taken away from me today,’ Altman said in the video. ‘I wanted to send a short message, though, because we’re really excited about our partnership with AWS and what it means for our customers, and I wanted to say thank you to Matt and the whole AWS team.’

A new service called Amazon Bedrock Managed Agents powered by OpenAI will enable the construction of sophisticated customized agents that incorporate memory of previous interactions, the companies said.

Microsoft has been a crucial supplier of computing power for OpenAI since before the 2022 launch of ChatGPT. Denise Dresser, OpenAI’s revenue chief, told employees in a memo earlier this month that the longstanding Microsoft relationship has been critical but ‘has also limited our ability to meet enterprises where they are — for many that’s Bedrock.’

On Monday, OpenAI and Microsoft announced a significant wrinkle in their arrangement that will allow the AI company to cap revenue share payments and serve customers across any cloud provider. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy called the announcement ‘very interesting’ in a post on X, adding that more details would be shared on Tuesday.

OpenAI and Amazon have been getting closer in other ways.

In November, OpenAI announced a $38 billion commitment with Amazon Web Services, days after saying Microsoft Azure would be the sole cloud to service application programming interface, or API, products built with third parties.

Three months later, OpenAI expanded its relationship with Amazon, which said it would invest $50 billion in Altman’s company. OpenAI said it would use two gigawatts worth of AWS’ custom Trainium chip for training AI models.

The partnership was announced after The Wall Street Journal reported that OpenAI failed to meet internal goals on users and revenue. Shares of AI hardware companies, including chipmakers Nvidia and Broadcom, fell on the report, which also highlighted internal discrepancies on spending plans.

‘This is ridiculous,’ Sam Altman and OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar said in a statement about the story. ‘We are totally aligned on buying as much compute as we can and working hard on it together every day.’

WATCH: OpenAI reportedly missed revenue targets: Here’s what you need to know