Intel Slowing its Pace for CPU Releases

Intel won't be making new processors at the same pace it once was.

The company announced in a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing this week that it will "lengthen the amount of time" it will use to offer its 14-nanometer and 10-nanometer processor technologies. The company argues that the move will help it optimize the investment it's placed into its technologies.

"We expect to lengthen the amount of time we will utilize our 14nm and our next-generation 10nm process technologies, further optimizing our products and process technologies while meeting the yearly market cadence for product introductions," Intel said in its filing.

Intel's move is notable. As processors become smaller and more powerful, research-and-development costs skyrocket. While Intel has long believed that it could continue to make chips smaller and more powerful, the company also wants to take advantage of longer lifecycles. Longer lifecycles, after all, allow Intel to make more of the chips it's already producing.

Intel has previously subscribed to the so-called "Tick-Tock" process with its chip development. The company would first begin with the process, or "tick," and follow that with the architecture, or "tock." The idea was to improve the chip development process to save costs, and then, when the process was ready, introduce a new chip design running atop it.

Now, though, Intel is leaving Tick-Tock beyond. In its place, the company will keep the process and architecture components of Tick-Tock, but add a new element: "optimization." That element allow Intel to use the technologies it's already developed for a longer period and thus, make more cash off its investments.

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Still, Intel was quick to note that as in years past, it will continue to deliver new versions of its 14- and 10-nanometer chips. It specifically mentioned the 14-nanometer Kaby Lake, which it says will deliver "key performance advancements" over the company's sixth-generation Intel Core processors.

So, while things will be changing a bit to how Intel goes about producing chips, we can all expect to see new versions of its processors finding their way to PCs in the coming years.