A day after formally taking the reins from Bob Swan as head of Intel, chief executive Pat Gelsinger this morning sent a memo to Intel employees in which he urged the company to become a “fountain of innovation” for the industry.
“We will be a fountain for continuous innovation in the industry through our unmatched IP, engineering talent and research into new next-generation computing architectures,” wrote Gelsinger.
Incoming Intel CEO Gelsinger had a thirty-year run at Intel before leaving to become CEO of software maker VMware. He was lured back after the company ran into repeated manufacturing issues and faced calls by activist investors for drastic action.
Gelsinger listed three other bullet points: to be a leader in every category in which Intel competes; to “execute flawlessly”; and to bring back “Groveian disciplines for direct, transparent and data-driven decisions and accountability,” referring to famed Intel co-founder and CEO the late Andy Grove.
Gelsinger reiterates in his memo his long history with Intel — he worked at the company for thirty years before becoming head of software maker VMware — and called the CEO role, once again, “my dream job.”
Gelsinger’s appointment was announced on January 13th, following a call by activist investor Third Point LLC for dramatic action at the company. He formally took over from Swan on February 15th.
The activism followed many years of manufacturing snafus for the company, including delays in producing its leading-edge processors, and share losses to competitor Advanced Micro Devices in the PC and server microprocessor market.
Gelsinger appeared on the company’s conference call for Q4 earnings on January 22nd, answering some questions and making some broad remarks about where he sees the company going.
Substantial skepticism remains on Wall Street that Gelsinger can fix what ails Intel.
