Intel tries to recover lost ground after chip flaw debacle
World’s biggest chipmaker was hit hardest by Meltdown and Spectre scare
By Richard Waters and Hannah Kuchler in San Francisco
When Paul Otellini, then chief executive of Intel, paid almost $7bn for security software company McAfee in 2010, he believed he was on an urgent mission.
The world’s digital infrastructure was at risk from hackers, he believed: only by “baking” security into the silicon at the heart of all computing systems could it be protected. The former Intel boss, who died last year, saw his personal role in strengthening the defences as nothing less than a national responsibility.
Seven years on, the world’s biggest chipmaker has just owned up to a flaw in its processors that is potentially far more serious than anything Mr Otellini envisaged. It is not alone — most modern processors have been found to have a similar flaw. But as the dominant producer of the processors at the heart of most PCs and servers, Intel has, inevitably, found itself the one most in the line of fire.
Intel’s shares fell 9 per cent in the week after the flaw was revealed earlier this month, in the face of a strongly rising stock market.
