Intel's disruption is now complete • Hacker News Board

Re: Intel's disruption is now complete

#241

Post by wnevets » Sat, Nov 14, 2020, 7:03 PM UTC

notSupplied wrote: post #92

SoSoRoCoCo wrote: post #20

As someone who worked on Intel's phone chip: we definitely didn't win it. We fucked it up twelve ways to Sunday. Why: giant egos. There were turf wars between Austin, Santa Clara and Israel over who would design it, and the team that won out had long since lost its best principle engineers and had no clue how to spin the architecture to meet the design win. Otellini's hindsight hedge is pure spin: we knew the landing…

I have a theory about why turf wars like this happens: the more successful and wealthy an entity, the greater opportunity there is for a manager to take wealth instead of make it. When you’re scrappy and broke, the only path to success is to make the company successful. When the company is rich and multitudinous, an individual can gain more from politics and turf wars rather than actually trying to push an already hi…

>the greater opportunity there is for a manager to take wealth instead of make it

Much like countries and empires. Once growth largely stops being the easiest way to capture wealth "entrepreneurs" start eating away from the inside.

Re: Intel's disruption is now complete

#242

Post by texasbigdata » Sat, Nov 14, 2020, 7:05 PM UTC

ben_w wrote: post #223

notSupplied wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a theory about why turf wars like this happens: the more successful and wealthy an entity, the greater opportunity there is for a manager to take wealth instead of make it. When you’re scrappy and broke, the only path to success is to make the company successful. When the company is rich and multitudinous, an individual can gain more from politics and turf wars rather than actually trying to push an already hi…

I’ve been thinking similar thoughts about politics. Normal countries can turn into superpowers, and then it looks (from my non-politically astute eyes) as if politicians fight for power over the nation at the expense of the nation itself, and in so doing turn the superpower back into a normal nation.

An additional set of guesses to add on: some individuals are temperamentally better at the extraction than production, prefer it, are more able to exercise deceit, and have less regret or self shame.

Re: Intel's disruption is now complete

#243

Post by klelatti » Sat, Nov 14, 2020, 7:06 PM UTC

eulers_secret wrote: post #159

sounds wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AnandTech's analysis corroborates what DeRock is saying here about the x86 variable length instructions being the limiting factor on how wide the decode stage can be. The other factor is Apple is using a "better" process node (TSMC 5nm). I put it in quotes because Intel's 10nm and upcoming nodes may be competitive, but Intel's 14nm is what Apple gets to compete against today, right now. Intel has been defeated in det…

> but Intel's 14nm is what Apple gets to compete against today, right now. Intel's 10nm node is out, I'm typing this on one right now. It's competitive in single-core performance against what we've seen from the M1. Graphics and multi-core it gets beat though... Or do you mean what Apple used to use? (edit: the following is incorrect) It's true Apple never used an Intel 10nm part. EDIT: I was wrong! Apple has used an…

Are you sure about the single core performance - Geekbench has the M1 far ahead against 10nm laptops?

Re: Intel's disruption is now complete

#244

Post by rossdavidh » Sat, Nov 14, 2020, 7:06 PM UTC

djmips wrote: post #240

notSupplied wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a theory about why turf wars like this happens: the more successful and wealthy an entity, the greater opportunity there is for a manager to take wealth instead of make it. When you’re scrappy and broke, the only path to success is to make the company successful. When the company is rich and multitudinous, an individual can gain more from politics and turf wars rather than actually trying to push an already hi…

I agree with you and a lot of the things people who are responding are saying but the one thing that keeps popping in my head is that Apple who is disrupting in this case isn't exactly the lightweight scrappy contender as put forth in the parables and anecdotes. If the hypothesis is true for Intel why is giant Apple not suffering from the same mercenary middle management / toxic political BS?

I'm sure they have it, but it occurs to me that they did go through a near-death experience that might have caused some of the worst baggage to abandon ship, and for a while afterwards they probably knew that it was possible for even a company as big as Apple to go under.

Now that it's been a while, it wouldn't totally shock me if they ended up drifting Intel's way eventually.

Re: Intel's disruption is now complete

#245

Post by bobthepanda » Sat, Nov 14, 2020, 7:08 PM UTC

djmips wrote: post #240

notSupplied wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a theory about why turf wars like this happens: the more successful and wealthy an entity, the greater opportunity there is for a manager to take wealth instead of make it. When you’re scrappy and broke, the only path to success is to make the company successful. When the company is rich and multitudinous, an individual can gain more from politics and turf wars rather than actually trying to push an already hi…

I agree with you and a lot of the things people who are responding are saying but the one thing that keeps popping in my head is that Apple who is disrupting in this case isn't exactly the lightweight scrappy contender as put forth in the parables and anecdotes. If the hypothesis is true for Intel why is giant Apple not suffering from the same mercenary middle management / toxic political BS?

Apple historically has concentrated leadership to a T (see: the Steve Jobs mythos) I don't recall hearing anything about Intel being nearly as centralized.

Steve Jobs apparently demolished internal units, with the following outcome:

> As was the case with Jobs before him, CEO Tim Cook occupies the only position on the organizational chart where the design, engineering, operations, marketing, and retail of any of Apple’s main products meet. In effect, besides the CEO, the company operates with no conventional general managers: people who control an entire process from product development through sales and are judged according to a P&L statement.

https://hbr.org/2020/11/how-apple-is-organized-for-innovatio...

Re: Intel's disruption is now complete

#246

Post by BurningFrog » Sat, Nov 14, 2020, 7:08 PM UTC

djmips wrote: post #240

notSupplied wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a theory about why turf wars like this happens: the more successful and wealthy an entity, the greater opportunity there is for a manager to take wealth instead of make it. When you’re scrappy and broke, the only path to success is to make the company successful. When the company is rich and multitudinous, an individual can gain more from politics and turf wars rather than actually trying to push an already hi…

I agree with you and a lot of the things people who are responding are saying but the one thing that keeps popping in my head is that Apple who is disrupting in this case isn't exactly the lightweight scrappy contender as put forth in the parables and anecdotes. If the hypothesis is true for Intel why is giant Apple not suffering from the same mercenary middle management / toxic political BS?

Apple probably has similar problems, but this particular sub-organization is healthy for now.

Maybe because it's newer and hasn't rotted yet.

Re: Intel's disruption is now complete

#247

Post by texasbigdata » Sat, Nov 14, 2020, 7:09 PM UTC

sjansen wrote: post #197

switch11 wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

that's a very astute observation having worked at all three of A Trillion Dollar corporation A smaller company that grew quite a bit and sold for $5 billion+ A start up now * People optimize for what will make them rich/wealthy In larger companies, the ENTIRE function of middle management is to extract wealth and not create it In some ways it's a miracle Microsoft managed to get Satya Nadella as CEO. Normally the peo…

> Normally the people who rise up the ranks are the politically astute Don't discount Nadella's political astuteness. I think it would be more accurate to say he is not merely politically astute, but instead able to combine his skill at internal politics with customer empathy and technical intelligence.

The conversation in Satyas own book of the trip to try to recruit some HP exec with Balmer where Satya pushed to take over some division and Balmer reluctantly agreed on the flight down to SF but told Satya he better be able to execute and quickly or he should work on his parachute skills, alone is hilarious when viewed through the lens you describe.

Re: Intel's disruption is now complete

#248

Post by jack_riminton » Sat, Nov 14, 2020, 7:10 PM UTC

djmips wrote: post #240

notSupplied wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a theory about why turf wars like this happens: the more successful and wealthy an entity, the greater opportunity there is for a manager to take wealth instead of make it. When you’re scrappy and broke, the only path to success is to make the company successful. When the company is rich and multitudinous, an individual can gain more from politics and turf wars rather than actually trying to push an already hi…

I agree with you and a lot of the things people who are responding are saying but the one thing that keeps popping in my head is that Apple who is disrupting in this case isn't exactly the lightweight scrappy contender as put forth in the parables and anecdotes. If the hypothesis is true for Intel why is giant Apple not suffering from the same mercenary middle management / toxic political BS?

Explained somewhat by the nature of the innovators dilemma and the products they're making: - x86 chips for PC were Intel's cash cow so doing anything to disrupt that revenue stream would be fought against - Apple's cash cow is the phone itself so they don't particularly have any dogmatic loyalty to one type of chip as long as the phone sells

Now if there were a technology to come up agains the iPhone (glasses anyone?) they'd probably face the same conundrum; disrupt themselves or be disrupted?

Re: Intel's disruption is now complete

#249

Post by PaulDavisThe1st » Sat, Nov 14, 2020, 7:10 PM UTC

whack wrote: post #194

This is a controversial opinion, but I don't agree with the idea that big corporations should make an entry into every single adjacent market. If the company has core expertise and advantages that can deliver a decisive win in a known-lucrative market, then it's a no brainer. But if that's not the case, why run around chasing shadows everywhere, instead of focusing on harvesting the markets where you're already winni…

> The purpose of a corporation isn't to continue existing in perpetuity, but rather, to maximize returns for its investors.

Society grants a group of people immunity from personal liability when they form an organization that has some chance of carrying out some useful work. The organization becomes a special kind of entity - a corporation. It can operate without its investors & officers fearing that their own wealth is on the line should something go wrong. Societies do this because it is widely believed that it would be impossible for various things to happen without it. That is, if personal liability was always in play, nobody would organize human organizations to try to accomplish difficult/dangerous tasks, and the same might also apply to unlikely-to-succeed-but-potentially-significant efforts.

That's what the purpose of a corporation is, not maximising returns for its investors, which is a recent idea (dating back to the 1970s) and has nothing to do with why corporations exist.

Re: Intel's disruption is now complete

#250

Post by texasbigdata » Sat, Nov 14, 2020, 7:10 PM UTC

humanlion87 wrote: post #233

switch11 wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

that's a very astute observation having worked at all three of A Trillion Dollar corporation A smaller company that grew quite a bit and sold for $5 billion+ A start up now * People optimize for what will make them rich/wealthy In larger companies, the ENTIRE function of middle management is to extract wealth and not create it In some ways it's a miracle Microsoft managed to get Satya Nadella as CEO. Normally the peo…

I highly doubt you can get to the executive level of such a large company without playing politics. And playing it well. It's inevitable.

There was a comment in one of the Google biographies that the execs fought so much (maybe bill Campbell? RIP) that Sundnar became the person to unwedge the egos and therefore got selected on that basis.