What Intel Investors Should Know About Chipmaker's Upcoming 'Unleashed' Event

Intel Corporation INTC, which is plotting its return to the dominant position in the chip industry, is hosting an event titled "Intel Unleashed: Engineering the Future" from 5-6 p.m. March 23. 

The Intel Analyst: Morgan Stanley analyst Joseph Moore maintained an Overweight rating on Intel with a $72 price target.

The Intel Takeaways: At the event, new CEO Pat Gelsinger is expected to give a business update on innovation and technology leadership at Intel, Moore said in a note.

The event should give a sense of the longer-term direction in whichi the new CEO will take the company and some of the confidence he will bring to Intel's outlook, the analyst said. 

Intel is likely to reiterate its headline strategy of using a combination of foundry and IDM to mitigate the impact of process delays and to execute better, he said. 

Moore said he expects to get a broader outline on the process of improvement.

Related Link: Why Intel's CEO Transition Is A Negative For AMD: Analyst

Intel could share details on new products shipping this quarter, mainly Ice Lake and the SuperFin server chip, the analyst said.

SuperFin, though its arrival was delayed, is seen as an important step forward for Intel, with higher memory bandwidth and potentially improved single-threaded performance, he said. 

The focus is also likely to be on the new Rocket Lake desktop chip, which officially launches March 30, Moore said.

The analyst also expects the company to reaffirm the timeline for the Sapphire Rapids, a multichip server chip based on the enhanced 10 nm SuperFin, and Alder Lake desktop processor.

Intel is unlikely to issue new financial commentary on shorter-term numbers, he said. 

The company is expected to lose marginal share this year, and will also lose share due to Apple Inc.'s AAPL move to ARM, Moore said.

The analyst also expects the company to signal higher capital spending and R&D spending.

"We think that nets out to consensus numbers being fairly reasonable, though if the company needs to spend more to solidify the market position we think most investors would agree that they should."

INTC Price Action: At last check, Intel shares were down 1.45% at $64.82. 

Related Link: 8 Intel Analysts On Q4 Report: Why Some See Difficult Years Ahead For Chipmaker