Intel CEO expands his desire to make Apple silicon chips, announces ‘competitive fun’ with Apple

In an interview with Yahoo Finance today, newly appointed Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger said the ongoing competition between his company and Apple is “fun”, while also saying he hopes to make peace with the technology giant in Cupertino.

In the next two years, Apple will transition its Mac line from Intel processors to its own Apple silicon chips. Apple is already well underway in the transition, having launched three Mac computers based on its M1 SoC. In response, Intel launched a marketing campaign last week to label Macs and the ‌M1‌ as inferior to Intel processors.

Despite the onslaught of attacks, Gelsinger has indicated that he hopes to have Apple as a future customer. In his interview with Yahoo Finance, Gelsinger said that Apple relies heavily on its current supplier, TSMC, for Apple’s silicon manufacturing and that Intel wants to offer its own services.

Apple is a customer and I hope to make them a big foundry customer, because today they are totally dependent on Taiwan Semiconductor. We want to present great options for them to take advantage of our foundry services, just as we are working with Qualcomm and Microsoft to leverage our foundry. We are going to deliver great technology, some things that cannot be done anywhere else in the world.

Gelsinger attributed the recent tense competition with Apple to the fact that there is still room for innovation in the industry and to the bonus that demand for PCs is the highest in more than a decade. Gelsinger went on to say that there is “competitive fun going on with the Apple and Mac ecosystem”.

So, obviously, you saw some of the competitive energies [in chipmaking] resume because there are many important innovations to be made, and we haven’t seen the demand for PCs at that level for a decade and a half. The world needs more of this, and there is competitive fun going on with the Apple and Mac ecosystem.

As part of its anti-Apple silicon marketing campaign, Intel recently hired former “I’m a Mac” actor Justin Long to star in a series of ads comparing ‌M1 Mac Macs to laptops with Intel processors. In addition, Intel turned to Twitter for the campaign and created its own website to compare ‌M1‌ Macs to PCs.