Six months after Lip-Bu Tan became CEO of Intel, the company has announced a new processor as part of a strategic plan to refocus on its core businesses. The hardware, codenamed Panther Lake, is produced in Arizona and utilizes the company’s 18A semiconductor process.
Panther Lake marks the next generation of the Intel Core Ultra processor family and is the first chip manufactured using the Intel 18A process. These processors are scheduled to begin shipping later this year. Production is underway at Intel’s Fab 52 facility in Chandler, Arizona, a site that came online in 2024. This announcement is the largest manufacturing reveal from the company since Tan took over leadership in March with a stated mission to restore its engineering-first culture.
In a company press release, CEO Lip-Bu Tan discussed the technological direction. “We are entering an exciting new era of computing, made possible by great leaps forward in semiconductor technology that will shape the future for decades to come,” Tan said. “Our next-gen compute platforms, combined with our leading-edge process technology, manufacturing, and advanced packaging capabilities, are catalysts for innovation across our business as we build a new Intel.”
The company’s press release highlighted that the 18A semiconductor represents the most advanced chip manufacturing process currently produced domestically within the United States. In a separate preview, Intel also detailed its upcoming Xeon 6+ server processor, codenamed Clearwater Forest. This will be the company’s first server-grade processor built on the same 18A-based architecture. Intel projects the Xeon 6+ will officially launch during the first half of 2026.
