Qualcomm, AMD, Intel Unveil New Processors at CES

Computer chips aren't flashy, but the industry did its best to convince CES attendees otherwise through keynotes accompanied by bright lights and EDM.

Qualcomm

The leading provider of mobile chipsets, Qualcomm is focused on 5G. On Monday, President Cristiano Amon said "2020 is the year we expect 5G to scale" with projections for 200 million 5G smartphone shipments. Qualcomm and Lenovo have teamed up for the world's first 5G laptop, which will retail in Spring 2020 for $1,499.

Qualcomm also announced Snapdragon Ride, an autonomous driving platform, and Car-to-Cloud, an on-demand cloud services platform. Qualcomm, which is already a leading provider of car infotainment system chips, will initially pitch Snapdragon Ride to manufacturers developing advanced driver assistance systems.

AMD

CEO Lisa Su was greeted like a rockstar ahead of AMD's press conference. Riding the excitement, AMD announced ultrathin, high-performance mobile and desktop processors for gaming and content creation applications.

• Fun fact: AMD's new Ryzen Threadripper processor has 64 computing cores on one chip, a first for consumer chips. But it costs almost $4,000.

"The new chips should further AMD's competitive position," the WSJ wrote, but the chipmaker will need to keep innovating to claw market share away from rival Intel. Speaking of...

Intel

The 51-year-old company wants to stave off a midlife crisis. CEO Bob Swan talked up 5G and edge computing and rehashed the company's recent AI investments and acquisitions.

• In December, Intel bought chip startup Habana Labs for $2 billion.
• In 2017, it acquired computer vision startup Mobileye for $15.3 billion.

Later, another Intel exec previewed the 3D Athlete Tracking system that will be used in the 2020 Olympics. Finally, Intel showcased a new line of mobile processors (codenamed Tiger Lake) for foldable tablets and computers.

Bottom line: Qualcomm's dominance in mobile has set it up for 5G and auto plays. AMD wants to siphon high-performance hardware business from Intel, which has made a few stumbles recently. Nonetheless, Intel is trying to shore up its core business by leading the shift to AI and foldable computing.