In the chips: Intel CEO says new technology 'tastes better and less filling'

Paul Otellini rose from Intel's marketing ranks, the first person to run the company without an engineering degree.

This week, Intel's chief executive is overseeing the introduction of a breakthrough new chip that represents one of the company's biggest engineering leaps. Otellini said he relies on his technologists to learn what's possible and then seeks innovations that offer genuine advances for the computer user.

"I look at products from not just a marketer's perspective, or a businessperson's perspective, but also from how people use these things," he said in a phone interview. "Does it make sense from a user perspective? What are the features? What are the benefits for us as consumers?"

Intel is counting on the new chip, code-named Penryn, to widen its technological lead over rivals. It also hopes the new technology's energy-conscious features will open the door to new, iPhone-style gadgets that rely on long battery life to bring video, music and the Internet to devices that fit in the palm of your hand.

The California-based company's newest chip technology was created by a team of 600 Oregon engineers who remade the most basic ingredients of a semiconductor.

In advance of Penryn's launch, Otellini spoke about the new chip.

Question: Talk a little bit about what the Penryn will mean to everyday computer users. How will this show up in people's lives?

Answer: That's real simple. They'll get faster computers that use less energy, have longer battery life and are smaller.

Question: Is it different, categorically, from the kinds of enhancements that Intel has made in the past? Do you plan to use it differently?

Answer: In terms of solving some of the basic problems of fundamental physics, and providing a greater-than-normal generational change, it is substantially different ... is at the transistor level increasing performance by 20 percent and decreasing power consumption by 30 (percent). And that is contrary to the laws of physics.

What the engineers at Intel have invented this year is a way to significantly change the basic structure of a transistor to give us both performance and power savings at the same time. It is the moral equivalent of 'Tastes better' and 'Less filling."'

Question: Can you give me an example of the types of products you see Penryn appearing in?