INTEL HAS LOST its leading chip architect, Jim Keller, after barely two years at the company. Keller will work as a consultant for six months to help in the transition as Intel shuffles around the heads of it engineering groups. Keller has resigned for undisclosed personal reasons, although it seems amicable enough, with Intel praising his work in an internal memo.
Keller has an impressive work history, including being a big hand in the Zen microarchitecture, Tesla’s Autopilot, and Apple’s A4 and A5 chips. His loss couldn’t come at a worse time for Intel: Just a couple of months ago he was the subject of an article in Fortune magazine that said Intel was “betting its chips” on the “mastermind” Keller, who was to be given room to make wide changes at Intel. His truncated tenure at Intel will be keenly felt: It typically takes four years to build a new chip micro-architecture.