Intel’s silicon + software strategy and why India is a 5G laggard

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Editor's note: For a hardware company, Intel has been talking a lot about putting its software ambitions front and centre since Pat Gelsinger came back to the company in February last year as the CEO (Gelsinger left Intel in 2009 after a 30-year run). The chipmaker wants to build and grow its business of selling software through SaaS products and software platforms. The fact that the company made $100 million in software revenue last year without any tangible effort to build sales validates the opportunity. Not to forget, Gelsinger does have a software business pedigree now as the former CEO of VMware. Intel disclosed the software earnings for the first time ever at its 2022 Investor Meeting earlier this year. Greg Lavender, head of the software division, told shareholders that software could bring in as much as $150 million this year. Lavender was previously the CTO at VMware when Gelsinger led the company. He too joined Intel in 2021 to lead the software and advanced technology division. Of course, $100 million is small change for a company that makes over $70 billion …