????世界上有兩種CEO,，一種喜歡聚光燈下的感覺(jué)，另一種則截然相反,。英特爾（Intel）首席執(zhí)行官保羅?奧特里尼就屬于后者,。不過(guò)今年一月當(dāng)他出席拉斯維加斯的消費(fèi)電子展（Consumer Electronics Show），站在數(shù)千名觀眾面前時(shí),，奧特里尼似乎也并不介意萬(wàn)眾矚目的感覺(jué),。那是一個(gè)史蒂夫?喬布斯式的時(shí)刻,。他從口袋里掏出一個(gè)閃閃發(fā)亮的四英寸智能手機(jī)，展示給在場(chǎng)的觀眾,。這個(gè)設(shè)備有很多特殊功能,，包括前后攝像頭和用于輸出高分辨率視頻的HDMI接口。
????不過(guò)這款手機(jī)上最讓人驚嘆的部分卻是觀眾用肉眼看不到的,，那就是它里面安裝的Medfield英特爾微處理器,。這款手機(jī)目前還沒(méi)有上市，只是英特爾內(nèi)部組裝的一臺(tái)原型機(jī),，但它還是讓許多人歡欣雀躍,，因?yàn)檫w延多年，走了很多彎路之后,，英特爾似乎終于推出了一款能在手機(jī)領(lǐng)域立足生根的產(chǎn)品,。
????奧特里尼在消費(fèi)電子展上發(fā)表講話后，本周在英特爾的硅谷總部接受了《財(cái)富》雜志（Fortune）的采訪,。他對(duì)記者說(shuō)：“我難道不希望早一點(diǎn)進(jìn)入智能手機(jī)領(lǐng)域嗎,？我也希望。但我們今天才進(jìn)入這個(gè)領(lǐng)域,，這有什么問(wèn)題嗎,？我不覺(jué)得。我認(rèn)為這個(gè)領(lǐng)域還在起步階段,。我們?nèi)匀挥袡C(jī)會(huì)重新定義移動(dòng)計(jì)算,。而且我不認(rèn)為這個(gè)行業(yè)的其它玩家擁有這種潛力?！?/p>
????年收入達(dá)540億美元的英特爾是世界最大的芯片制造商,，員工超過(guò)100,000名，其中包括半導(dǎo)體行業(yè)一些最杰出的人才,。但在智能手機(jī)芯片方面,，英特爾至今未立寸功。目前市場(chǎng)上還沒(méi)有任何一款搭載英特爾處理器的手機(jī),。這可不是個(gè)小問(wèn)題,，目前全世界對(duì)智能手機(jī)和平板電腦的使用日益遞增，人們?cè)絹?lái)越喜歡用它們來(lái)完成過(guò)去靠臺(tái)式機(jī)或筆機(jī)本電腦才能完成的工作,。
????英特爾在生產(chǎn)強(qiáng)大的高性能芯片方面具有非常尖端的技術(shù),，但這反過(guò)來(lái)卻成了英特爾進(jìn)軍移動(dòng)領(lǐng)域的障礙，因?yàn)橹悄苁謾C(jī)芯片需要的是低功率的處理器,。一年半以前,，奧特里尼認(rèn)為英特爾需要一些在手機(jī)行業(yè)擁有堅(jiān)實(shí)從業(yè)經(jīng)驗(yàn)的管理人員和工程師，于是他聘用了曾在Palm和蘋果（Apple）任職的邁克?貝爾,。貝爾曾對(duì)蘋果iPhone的研發(fā)做出過(guò)貢獻(xiàn),，現(xiàn)在他是英特爾新成立的移動(dòng)通信集團(tuán)的負(fù)責(zé)人之一,，負(fù)責(zé)設(shè)計(jì)或參考設(shè)計(jì)原型機(jī)，以向手機(jī)廠商展示英特爾在移動(dòng)通信方面的能力,。英特爾在消費(fèi)電子展上展出的手機(jī)使用了自家的Medfield芯片,，它的內(nèi)部代號(hào)為FFRD，是Form Factor Reference Design（外型因素參考設(shè)計(jì)）的縮寫,，可見(jiàn)起個(gè)拉風(fēng)的產(chǎn)品代號(hào)確實(shí)不是英特爾的長(zhǎng)項(xiàng),。這臺(tái)原型機(jī)為今年聯(lián)想（Lenovo）和摩托羅拉（Motorola）等廠商發(fā)布搭載英特爾芯片的設(shè)備鋪平了道路。
????奧特里尼知道,，他要做的不僅僅是聘用幾個(gè)關(guān)鍵人員而已,。2010年8月，英特爾斥資14億美元收購(gòu)了德國(guó)芯片制造商英飛凌（Infineon）的無(wú)線業(yè)務(wù),，使英特爾在基帶處理器領(lǐng)域有了立足點(diǎn)（基帶處理器是用來(lái)管理智能手機(jī)3G無(wú)線電通信功能的元件）,，此次收購(gòu)也給英特爾帶來(lái)了大約4,000名熟悉移動(dòng)設(shè)備的員工。 |
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????There are two kinds of CEOs: Those who love the spotlight and those who hate it. Paul Otellini, chief executive officer of Intel, falls into the latter category. But in January, as he stood in front of several thousand people at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Otellini didn't seem to mind the attention. In a Steve Jobs-like moment, he pulled a shiny four-inch smartphone out of his pocket and held it up for the audience to see. The device had plenty of bells and whistles, including front- and back-facing cameras and an HDMI output for high-resolution video.
????Most striking of all was what the audience couldn't see: the tiny Intel microprocessor -- called Medfield -- inside. The phone wasn't for sale (it was a prototype Intel had put together), but the crowd cheered anyway. After years of delays and missteps, Intel, it seemed, finally had a viable product to show for its efforts in mobile phones.
????"Would I have liked to be earlier? Yes," Otellini told Fortune in an interview at the company's Silicon Valley headquarters the week after his Las Vegas keynote. "Do I think this is a problem entering today? No, I think we're in the beginning of this thing. We have the opportunity to redefine what computing means in your pocket, and I don't see any other player in the industry with that potential."
????Intel (INTC), with $54 billion in annual revenue, is the biggest chipmaker in the world. It employs 100,000 workers, including some of the brightest minds in the semiconductor industry. But when it comes to powering mobile phones, Intel is nowhere. Not a single commercially available mobile phone uses an Intel processor, and that's no small problem, since much of the world is increasingly using mobile phones -- and tablets -- to do tasks once performed on desktops and laptops.
????Intel's prowess in building brawny, high-powered chips has been its biggest obstacle to cracking the mobile world, which requires low-power processors. A year and a half ago Otellini decided that Intel needed managers and engineers with hard-core mobile experience. He hired Mike Bell, an executive from Palm and Apple (AAPL) who had contributed to the development of the iPhone. Bell, who now co-leads Intel's newly formed mobile and communications group, was charged with building a prototype, or reference design, that would show manufacturers what Intel could do in mobile. The device, which used the Medfield chip, became known internally as FFRD, short for form factor reference design (sexy code names are not Intel's forte), and it paved the way for manufacturers like Lenovo and Motorola (MMI) to commit to launching Intel-powered devices sometime this year.
????But Otellini knew he needed to do more than make a few key hires. In August 2010, Intel bought the wireless-solutions business from German chipmaker Infineon for $1.4 billion, giving Intel a foothold in baseband processors (a component that manages the 3G radio functions in a smartphone) and about 4,000 employees who know mobile devices. |
