Intel is losing ground fast, and the fight is unfolding in plain sight. The company is still trying to rebuild its standing after years of delays, but the momentum isn’t going its way.
Its latest earnings beat showed some strength in data center products, yet the company is still struggling to steady itself, according to Yahoo Finance.
While it tries to fix its long-running problems, AMD is taking slices of the same markets Intel used to dominate without competition.
The pressure is coming from every direction. In both the PC and data center sectors, AMD is not waiting for Intel to recover, as the numbers coming out of New York this week made that painfully clear for Intel bulls.
AMD sets aggressive revenue goals
At AMD’s Financial Analyst Day in New York on Tuesday, Lisa Su told investors she expects the company to take 50% of server CPU revenue in the next three to five years through its Epyc chips.
For context, AMD currently holds about 40%, and it wants to close the gap entirely. Su also said the company is looking for 10% revenue growth across its client division, which handles gaming and PC chips.
That would push AMD above 40% client revenue share, up from today’s 28%.
Those targets point to a huge drag on Intel, which Mercury Research says could see its client market share fall from 72% to about 60%.
And because Intel and AMD are the only companies building x86 chips, the impact hits the core of Intel’s identity. These chips power the bulk of today’s PCs and servers, making this fight central to the future of both companies.
Not everyone thinks these numbers are guaranteed. Stacy Rasgon, an analyst at Bernstein, called AMD’s goals “somewhat aggressive/aspirational, but also not necessarily outside the realm of possibility if one wants to dream.” It was a polite way of saying the ambition is large, and the market will decide how much AMD gets.
But the threat to Intel is not theoretical. It is happening now. Daniel Newman, CEO of The Futurum Group, said AMD has performed “incredibly well” in the data center CPU business. Daniel said the company is winning sales from hyperscalers and expanding inside the enterprise sector at a steady pace. He added that AMD’s run has been helped by Intel’s own problems, which have dragged on for several years and created openings for AMD to move in.
Intel tries to recover while fighting on multiple fronts
Intel is not just standing still. The company has started rolling out its long-delayed 18A chip technology, used inside the Core Ultra Series 3 CPUs for PCs and the Xeon 6+ chips for servers.
These products are meant to show progress after years of setbacks that frustrated investors and customers.
The reality, though, is that both Intel and AMD are also chasing Nvidia. Nvidia holds between 80% and 90% of the AI GPU market, putting everyone else in a distant position. But AMD is already ahead of Intel in this space.
Su told attendees she expects AMD’s AI GPU revenue to jump 60% in the next three to five years, climbing from the $16 billion the company projects for 2025.
Intel revealed its own next-generation AI data center chip in October. Called Crescent Island, the chip uses the company’s Xe3P microarchitecture and will include up to 160GB of memory. It is part of Intel’s plan to regain relevance in AI after falling far behind.
Daniel summed up the situation like this:- “Intel is healing right now. It is finding focus and improved economics. But AMD is executing and has momentum. The chance of Intel losing its No. 1 position in CPU and DC CPU is real. It has the chance to rectify, but the risk is there.”
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