Anand Chandrasekher, senior vice president and general manager of Intel Corp.’s ultra mobility group, said in a statement that senior Intel executives, who made comments regarding performance of ARM processors in general and Apple iPhone in particular, earlier this week, should not make statements like that. Mr. Chandrasekher also admitted that it has no chips to compete against ARM now.

Earlier this week two of Intel’s high-ranking executives criticized ARM micro-architecture-based microprocessors claiming that their performance was inadequate for today’s task. Vice president of the mobility group and director of strategic planning of platform architecture and software for the ultra mobility group, Shane Wall, said that if someone wanted to run “full Internet”, he or she would need an x86 central processing unit, not and ARM-based chip.

As general manager of the Group responsible for Intel's ultra-mobility products, Mr. Chandrasekher acknowledged that Intel’s low-power Atom processor does not yet match the battery life characteristics of the ARM processor in a phone form factor; and, that while Intel does have plans on the books to get us to be competitive in the ultra low power domain, it is not there as yet.  

In addition, Intel’s execs also criticized Apple iPhone smartphone citing low-performance chips. 

“The shortcomings of the iPhone are not because of Apple.The shortcomings of the iPhone have come from ARM,” said Pankaj Kedia, director global ecosystem programs at Intel. 

According to the boss of Mr. Kedia, Apple's iPhone offering is “an extremely innovative product that enables new and exciting market opportunities”.  

“The statements made in Taiwan were inappropriate, and Intel representatives should not have been commenting on specific customer designs,” concluded Mr. Chandrasekher.

Tags: Intel, Atom, ARM