Intel moves on from three executives as manufacturing pivot continues

Chip making firm, Intel has announced the retirement of three senior executives as part of sweeping changes to its manufacturing and technology development operations.

The move comes under the direction of new chief executive Lip-Bu Tan, who is seeking to reposition the US chipmaker after years of market share losses and rising competition.

The company is restructuring amid cost-cutting initiatives

Kaizad Mistry and Ryan Russell, both corporate vice presidents in Intel’s technology development group, are set to step down, along with Gary Patton, head of the company’s Design Technology Platform. Patton, a former IBM executive, had overseen several advanced manufacturing initiatives.

The departures were communicated internally on Tuesday and mark the latest in a series of leadership shifts aimed at streamlining operations and cutting costs.

Intel is also scaling back its manufacturing capacity planning and engineering teams, according to sources familiar with the matter. These changes follow a broader shake-up of the company’s manufacturing group, now led by Naga Chandrasekaran, a former Micron Technology executive brought in last year.

Chandrasekaran assumed expanded responsibilities in March and has since led a reorganization of staff, including layoffs, as part of a global restructuring.

As part of its second-quarter results, Intel said it aims to reduce its global workforce to around 75,000 by the end of the year, a cut of about 22%. The tech giant employed 109,800 people at the end of last year. Of these, 99,500 were “core employees” according to The Verge.

In late June, the company closed its automotive chip making business and indicated it would lay off 20% of factory workers.

The company has pledged to take a more “disciplined” approach to capital expenditure, particularly in chip manufacturing.

Intel’s strategy shift hinges on customer buy-in

One of the clearest signs of a strategic pivot is Intel’s decision to tie investment in its next-generation 14A chip process to customer demand.

In a memo released alongside its latest results, CEO Tan said: “We’re developing Intel 14A from the ground up in close partnership with large external customers. Going forward, our investment… will be based on confirmed customer commitments.”

Without a major client on board, Intel has warned it may pause or abandon the 14A development altogether. A similar review is underway for its 18A process, which the company says only makes economic sense if reserved for its own products.

Nonetheless, it still still plans to use the 18A node in its Panther Lake chips, due to ramp up for high-volume production later this year.

The leadership changes also come at a difficult moment for Intel’s ambitions in AI. Rivals Nvidia and AMD have outpaced the company in both hardware and software, particularly in data centers and machine learning applications.

Nvidia currently dominates the AI chip market with over 80% share and posted $18.4 billion in data center revenue in the third quarter of 2025 alone. AMD’s upcoming MI300 accelerator is expected to generate over $2 billion in sales this year. Intel’s Gaudi AI processors, by contrast, have been positioned as cost-effective rather than high-performance alternatives.

Analysts say this leaves Intel with a steep climb to relevance in a fast-evolving sector increasingly defined by developer ecosystems like Nvidia’s CUDA.

However, as previously reported by Cryptopolitan, Intel revealed earlier in April that it was redesigning its AI portfolio to narrow the gap with Nvidia. As part of this initiative, the company said it would also look at emerging AI needs like robotics and smart agents.

Intel declined to comment on the executive retirements or internal restructuring.

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