Intel: ‘Panther Lake’ will be our hybrid hero for the PC

Intel executives pledged Tuesday that its upcoming Panther Lake chip will combine the best aspects of its earlier processors, Lunar Lake and Arrow Lake.

Intel executives spoke in Las Vegas on the second day of its Intel Vision conference, which engages Intel’s partners and customers. Intel’s new chief executive Lip-Bu Tan outlined his plans for Intel’s new direction on Monday, asking for brutal honesty while pledging to return Intel to greatness.

We already knew that Panther Lake would be a critical product for Intel this year. Not only is the chip the next iteration of Intel’s PC client roadmap, but it’s the first chip on Intel’s next-generation 18A manufacturing process. After falling behind in the critical manufacturing process technology race, former chief executive Pat Gelsinger pushed hard to achieve five process technology nodes in four years, culminating in the 18A process. Gelsinger stepped down last year, but achieving that goal would be an important legacy.

Executives said that they’ve entered “risk production” with 18A, essentially freezing the process technology development and beginning to scale up the process for eventual volume shipments.

Panther Lake will be crucial for Intel

Jim Johnson, senior vice president of Intel’s Client Computing Group, told Vision attendees that Panther Lake would be a hybrid of Intel’s earlier chips.

“I’m personally excited about Panther Lake because it combines the power efficiency of Lunar Lake, the performance of Arrow Lake, and is built to scale 18A and is on track for production later this year,” Johnson said. “Our client roadmap is the most innovative we’ve ever had, and we are far from done.”

Mark Hachman / IDG

In a letter to shareholders, Tan said that “Nova Lake” would follow the launch of Panther Lake. Nova Lake will debut in 2026, he said.

As he has done before, Johnson reiterated that making great AI begins with creating a great PC. Intel has also invested heavily in software development, trying to lure developers to the Intel platform and make Intel’s Core and other chips the engine of client AI. In that vein, Intel announced a new AI showcase to help customers find AI-optimized applications, and especially those designed for Intel. Intel also designed its own app, called AI Playground, which allows consumers using Intel chips to run AI art and an LLM chatbot, all in a single app.

Intel typically announces technical details of its next-generation chips around the Computex show, scheduled for the end of May.

AI, AI, AI: Intel’s 2025 priorities

Michelle Johnston Holthaus, who has returned to her post as the head of Intel’s products business after temporarily serving as Intel’s co-chief executive officer, outlined her three priorities for 2025 for the company at large. Two involved artificial intelligence.

“The Intel product group is focused on three key priorities to drive your success,” she said. “First and foremost, winning in AI PCs and enabling you to capture the AI client opportunity from the edge to automotive, to the PC and to the workstation. Second, strengthening our data center capabilities across traditional data centers and workloads in order to help you maximize your existing investments, such as refreshing to recapture space, reducing power, all while reducing your total cost of ownership.

“And third, we’ve got to continue to innovate in AI, enabling the next generation of software and hardware, while helping you future-proof critical infrastructure to leverage the power of AI through full stack solutions,” Holthaus explained.