Jobs’ decision helped set off a two-decade decline for an iconic Silicon Valley brand. The company was once so celebrated for its chipmaking innovations that hardware makers clamored to attach “Intel inside” stickers to their devices. But Intel went on to miss not only the mobile revolution, but the AI era, as competitors stole its market share.
“If there’s a problem and you tell me about it early, it’s our problem, and we’ve got to fix it. If you have a problem, and you don’t tell me, it’s your problem,” Tan told everyone at Intel upon his arrival, Zinsner recalls.
While it’s too soon to say whether Intel will complete its comeback, it clearly has learned from past mistakes. According to Zinsner, Tan has largely departed from his predecessors’ tradition of frequently quoting Andy Grove. He has, however, adopted and repeated one of Grove’s most famous maxims: “Only the paranoid survive.”
