Intel unveils new AI chips as it seeks to take on Nvidia and AMD

U.S. chipmaker Intel on Tuesday announced new artificial intelligence chips for data centers, as it looks to take on rivals Nvidia and AMD which have showcased upcoming chips in the last two days.

Intel’s Xeon 6 processor will deliver better performance and power efficiency for high-intensity data center workloads as compared to its predecessor, CEO Pat Gelsinger said during the Computex tech conference in Taiwan.

The announcement comes as rivals Nvidia and AMD launched new AI chips on Sunday and Monday, respectively, as they jostle for leadership in the booming industry.

It also comes six months after Intel launched its 5th Gen Intel Xeon processors for data center workloads and two months after announcing the Gaudi 3 processor for AI model training and deployment.

Intel on Tuesday also revealed that prices for the Gaudi 2 and Gaudi 3 AI accelerators are lower than that of rival chips.

“Customers are looking for high performance, cost-effective gen AI training and inferencing solutions. And they’ve started to turn to alternatives like Gaudi. They want choice. They want open software and hardware solutions and time to market solutions at dramatically lower TCOs [total cost of ownership],” Gelsinger said.

Intel also revealed architecture details for its upcoming Lunar Lake processors “to continue to grow the AI PC category.” The Lunar Lake chips, expected to ship in the third quarter, will compete against Nvidia’s and AMD’s chips that are specifically designed for AI PCs.

Intel is trying to catch up to Nvidia and AMD, after having largely been on the sidelines of the AI frenzy which saw tech giants like Meta, Microsoft and Google buying up as many Nvidia chips as possible.