Believe it or not, between 2002 and 2006 Intel made processors for mobile phones that used ARM’s architecture. The division responsible for all that amazing work was known as XScale. Intel sold XScale to Marvell during the summer of 2006, one year before Apple released the iPhone and redefined what a mobile phone was capable of. I bet Intel’s kicking themselves in the ass over that. Anyway, since then Intel has been trying to get someone, anyone, to build a smartphone that uses their x86 chips. In layman’s terms: they want a company like HTC or Samsung to build a mobile phone that uses the same kind of processor that’s inside a laptop computer. Intel has obviously failed to convince anyone to do that, though that might soon change thanks to a deal they signed with Google back in September that says all future versions of Android will be optimized for x86 processors. But that’s not enough. According to a report from Reuters published yesterday, Intel’s going to restructure the company:
Chipmaker Intel is combining four divisions under a new mobile and communications unit in a bid to catch up in smartphones and tablets, where it has so far failed to gain traction.
The new division combines Intel’s netbook and tablets division, its ultra mobility division, the mobile communications division and the mobile wireless division, spokesman Robert Manetta told Reuters.
“The ultimate goal is we want to speed up and improve the development process,” he said.
The new division will be headed by Mike Bell, who moved to Intel last year after playing a hand in the development of the iPhone at Apple, and by former Infineon executive Hermann Eul. Eul had headed Intel’s mobile communications division, which included the cellphone technology business it bought from Infineon in January.
Googling Mike Bell turns up his LinkedIn profile, which says he was a Vice President at Apple between 1991 and 2007. Next he was Senior Vice President of Product Development at Palm between December 2007 and July 2010. His current role, which he’s had since July 2010, is Vice President and General Manager of Ultra Mobility at Intel.
In other words, Mike knows his shit.