The AI PC race has kicked off this year with new hardware featuring powerful NPUs from various manufacturers. However, Intel seems to be falling behind in this competition. While the company technically launched its Meteor Lake line of processors late last year, there have been reports of delays in the shipments of its Lunar Lake laptop CPUs, now tentatively named the Intel Core Ultra 200. According to anonymous sources cited by DigiTimes, these CPUs are now expected to be shipped in September instead of June, putting Intel months behind competitors Qualcomm and AMD. The three companies have recently introduced their latest laptop processors designed to meet Microsoft’s new Copilot+ PC standards, which utilize new SoCs for generative AI workloads.
Microsoft defines a Copilot+ PC as one with an NPU capable of performing at least 40 TOPS (trillion operations per second). Intel’s Core Ultra 100 (Meteor Lake) series, which is currently available in some Copilot-branded products, falls just short of this requirement with 34 TOPs. On the other hand, Qualcomm’s Arm-based Snapdragon-powered notebooks meet the standard, and Microsoft’s Copilot+ AI software features are currently exclusive to Snapdragon but will be available on other PC AI processors through a free update later this year or early next year.
Qualcomm’s success in this field has prompted AMD and Intel to speed up their AI PC plans. Team Red plans to release its Ryzen AI 300 (Strix Point) line with 50 TOPS in July, while Intel’s Lunar Lake processors aim to provide at least 40 TOPS and other features like memory in the package. The delay in Intel’s shipments could put the company at a disadvantage, especially during the back-to-school shopping season when students and parents are looking for advanced options for the upcoming school year. However, Intel’s Core Ultra 200 series will have another opportunity to compete during the 2024 holiday season.
In addition to Qualcomm, AMD, and Intel, Apple is also expected to join the competition with the introduction of new Macbooks featuring the Apple Silicon M4 SoCs later this year and early next year. The M4 SoCs have NPUs capable of 38 TOPS and are currently found in the latest iPads. Updates to MacOS and iOS in late 2024 will bring on-device AI functionality similar to Microsoft’s Copilot suite.
Overall, the race for AI PC dominance is heating up with strong competition between major hardware manufacturers like Intel, Qualcomm, AMD, and Apple. The delay in Intel’s Lunar Lake shipments could potentially impact the company’s position in the market, but the upcoming holiday season will provide another opportunity for Intel to showcase its capabilities and compete with its rivals.
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