Intel CEO Debuts Next-Gen Skylake CPU, And Touts IoT And Big Data As Its Future

Intel CEO Brian Krzanich set out to prove Intel isn't an out-of-date tech company Tuesday at the chip-maker's annual Intel Developers Forum in San Francisco. Onstage, Krzanich kicked off the conference showcasing wearables, smartphones and wireless charging technologies he said are examples of new markets Intel is breaking into.

Krzanich formally launched its Edison platform, a postage-stamp-sized computer that utilizes a 22nm chip with on-board Wi-Fi and Bluetooth designed for the Internet of Things and the next generation of wearable devices. Intel also announced its next-gen Skylake platform, the chip-maker's successor to Broadwell, which Intel said will usher in a world of completely cable-free PCs and devices.

Kirk Skaugen, general manager of Intel's PC Client Group, demonstrated a desktop PC operating on a Skylake chip running 4K video and said the processor would deliver a significant increase in performance, battery life and power efficiency. The chip is expected to be available to developers in the first half of 2015.

[Related: Intel's New 18-Core Xeon Sparks Server Bonanza]

"Intel offers hardware and software developers new ways to grow as well as design flexibility. If it's smart and connected, it is best with Intel," Krzanich said.

Krzanich said Intel has made big gains as it tries to break into new markets. He said Intel was the No. 2 shipper of tablets in Q2. "I don't think a lot of people realize that," Krzanich said.

He also touted Intel's investments in the burgeoning Internet of Things market saying that, today, 2 billion devices are connected to the Internet and that by 2020 that number would grow to 50 billion. "Big data is big today, but it's going to be even bigger tomorrow," Krzanich said.

Krzanich also put the spotlight on his PC processors, inviting CEO Michael Dell on stage to talk about server, client and PC technology.

Michael Dell plugged his company's 13G servers and demonstrated a new Dell Venue 8, 7000 series tablet. The tablet includes Intel's RealSense technology, which integrates multiple cameras. That way, a user can manipulate images after they are taken by adjusting the focus on different image depths in much the same way the Lytro camera technology works.

He also touted Dell's growth in client PC sales and took a jab at Krzanich's focus on nontraditional computing devices. "When you get back to your PC, give it a hug," Dell said. "It's OK to love your PC."

To that end, both Dell's and Krzanich's announcements came just the day before Intel unveils its Haswell Xeon E5-2600 V3 server processor.

Also taking to the stage was Diane Bryant, Intel's general manager of its Data Center Group, who said that the "big data" economy was driving demand for a new series of Xeon chips. She said 1.9 billion smartphones are in use around the world today that drive trillions of data center transactions a day. "In six years, smartphone transactions will be surpassed by wearables, which will account for 50 percent of all data center transactions," Bryant said.

Intel showcased a number of Internet of Things partnerships with organizations such as The Michael J. Fox Foundation. The partnership aims to improve Parkinson's disease monitoring and treatment through advanced technologies.

"Health care is the biggest opportunity for big data and the IoT," Bryant said. "It's the one industry that can benefit the most from monitoring. It also has the potential to reduce risk, drive down cost and create new revenue streams."

Krzanich also spoke about a new Analytics for Wearables (A-Wear) developer program for aiding in creating software and hardware around the Intel ecosystem.

During the keynote, Krzanich also revealed commercial availability of the Intel XMM 7260 modem that's shipping in the Samsung Galaxy Alpha smartphone outside the U.S. Also on display was Intel's Wireless Gigabit Docking technology, which includes wireless docking, wireless display and wireless charging via an Intel reference design.

"This generation of PCs will be completely wire-free," Krzanich said. Other Intel innovations he said the company is working to deliver include new biometric technologies that would eliminate the need for passwords.

PUBLISHED SEPT. 9, 2014