2013 Year in Review, Intel

KUALA LUMPUR, November 20, 2013: The last twelve months have been packed full of exciting innovations, with the Asia Pacific region proving once again why it’s a technology hot spot. 2013 saw the tablet market explode with smaller form factor devices, capturing the minds of consumers, while the connected world has given birth to a new focus for governments and industry with Big Data. Forward-thinking governments are already capitalizing on the amazing benefits associated with the trend.

This year, Intel launched a range of exciting products focusing on innovation and delivering next generation processors that became the backbone for a new era of thinner, faster and more portable devices. Intel also worked closely with industry experts and government heads to help connect people across the Asia Pacific region, and provide cost-effective solutions to address key issues such as education and training.

1. Changing the PC landscape
One of the anticipated announcements of the year was the release of Intel’s 4th Generation Core Processor, enabling a range of 2 in 1 convertible devices that can act as both a tablet and a PC. Intel Labs conducted research that found PC’s are nearly twice as fast as they were 4 years ago at 1.8x the speed.

Where you really notice the difference is multimedia – converting videos now happens at a pace that’s 23x faster.

Convertible devices may also provide a smoother and more intuitive process for people with touch screens, voice assistance, high resolutions displays and some even boast facial recognition.

There’s also been an increase in the number of NFC compatible devices that enable users to pay by waving a compatible credit card across the NFC sensor that sits below the keyboard on select devices.

It wasn’t just tablets and desktops that surprised and delighted in 2013, the launch of Intel’s Silvermont microarchitecture in May, introduced an innovative 22nm Tri-Gate System-on-a-Chip (SoC) process, promising to deliver significant increases in performance and energy efficiency. Silvermont delivers ~3x more peak performance or the same performance at ~5x lower power over current-generation Intel® Atom™ processor core .

Another massive release for the device market was the Intel Atom Processor Z3000 series which has been designed for tablets and smart phones. Known as Bay Trail, the chip has been designed to increase battery life on high usage devices and allows manufacturers to provide thinner, lighter and more powerful devices at a range of different price points.

Bay Trail is available in three types, Bay Trail-T (Intel’s Atom Processor Z3000 series) is for tablets while Bay Trail-M and Bay Trail-D are for entry level devices in the laptop and desktop space. The family of SoCs allows one hardware configuration for both the Windows8 and Android platform to drive a wider choice of devices for both consumers and business users.

We observed that prices have dropped in a number of tablet markets this year. We’ve seen ASUS and Dell bring out devices that capitalise on the impressive battery life and standby power available with Bay Trail. The Asus Transformer Book T100 comes with a 10.1 inch display and an 11 hour battery life. Other new products are expected to be released by AAVA*, Acer*, Lenovo* and Toshiba*.

2. Big Data
Industry analyst firm International Data Corp (IDC) projects the global big data technology and services market to grow at more than 31 per cent each year. Revenues are forecast at US$23.8 billion by 2016.

2013 saw Intel launch the Big Data Innovation Center in Singapore with Dell and Revolution Analytics. It provides a platform for companies to test-run big data initiatives and proof-of-concepts for deployment. The center offers comprehensive training programs, proof-of-concept capabilities and solution development support for big data and predictive analytics, specifically tailored to the Asia Pacific region.

Intel also announced its first venture into Big Data software with the Intel Distribution for Apache Hadoop software. Intel believes the conceptual technology can help governments prepare for smart cities and assist telecommunications companies to improve their network and revenue streams.

China’s Zhejiang Province has deployed an Intelligent Transportation System for traffic management and can now track commercial vehicles for security surveillance. More than 3,000 cameras are being deployed across the city with GPS terminals – and the Intel Distribution for Apache Hadoop software allows the government to store, monitor, search and analyze 2.5 petabytes of data in real time every month.

Changing the way we view data center-based graphics – the new Intel® Xeon® processor E3-1200 v3 product family is a huge leap forward in the design of processors. Built on the 22-nanometer manufacturing process and featuring ‘Haswell’ architecture, the new Intel® processor microarchitecture transforms server capabilities and creates new possibilities for the data center.

From 2012 to 2020 the amount of stored data will double every two years , reaching 40ZB. Fast, on-demand access to this amount of data for tasks such as big data analytics require more intelligent compute and storage intensive solutions, as well as a dramatic decrease in the cost-per-stored terabyte.

Keeping up with the huge increase in data is vital and the new Intel® Xeon® processor E5-2600 and E5-1600 v2 processors, based on Intel’s leading 22-nanometer process technology, have been designed to offer more security to private clouds. Also designed to help bring down costs for enterprises, the processors are designed to power cost efficient scale-out, distributed, and software defined storage.

3. Enabling tomorrow’s innovators
The Intel International Science and Engineering Fair is one of the world’s largest high school science research competition, encouraging millions of students to use their imagination to come up with innovative solutions across a range of areas. Young scientists and next-generation entrepreneurs are encouraged to tackle topics ranging from environmental disasters to cancer treatments.

This year more than 1,500 students from around the globe were given the opportunity to travel to Phoenix, Arizona to present their ideas.

Ionut Budisteanu, 19, of Romania was awarded first place for using artificial intelligence to create a viable model for a low-cost, self-driving car. Ionut said his research addresses a major global issue. In 2004, car accidents caused 2.5 million deaths worldwide , and 87 per cent of crashes resulted from driver error . With 3-D radar and mounted cameras, Ionut created a feasible design for an autonomously controlled car that could detect traffic lanes and curbs, along with the real-time position of the car – and this solution may only cost $4,000.

In Malaysia, Nur Liyana Johari from Tuanku Syed Putra Secondary Science School won second award from the United Airlines Foundation and third award in the environmental management: recycling and waste management category and was awarded US$5,000.00 and US$1,000.00 respectively for her project entitled ‘BIO-OIL: the use of specially made catalyst’. Sarah Wong Jia Xin from SMK Batu Lintang won third award in the engineering: electrical and mechanical category and was awarded US$1,000.00 for her project entitled ‘use of biosorbent for removal of colour and heavy metal from dyed waste water’.

Boosting economic development through investment
Intel Capital has been investing in APAC since 1998, totaling over US$2 billion to date in the region. Intel Capital’s areas of focus are mobile computing, consumer Internet, cloud computing, Ultrabook, software and services, smartphones and semiconductor design and manufacturing. In 2013 year-to-day, Intel Capital announced six new investments in Asia Pacific and saw two portfolio company exits through IPO including: Aspeed Technology (Taiwan) and Montage Technology (China).

In 2013 Intel continued to reinforce its investment in partners across the globe. During the last year the Gold and Platinum membership of the Intel Technology Partner (ITP) program experienced a 50 per cent increase in the Asia Pacific. The program now has a total of 9,399 Gold and Platinum partners across Asia Pacific and 31,700 globally. The ITP program is designed to help train, support and position channel partners for sustained growth, by both supporting their current business models and helping them identify and capture new opportunities in the market.

Investing in the communities we work and live in
Communities are built on the people within them, and Intel’s employees are the conduit by which the company interacts and immerses itself within its communities. The Intel employee volunteer program – ‘Intel Involved’ – is designed to empower, support and recognize employees who volunteer in their communities. Through this approach we ensure that our involvement with communities provides long-term solutions rather than reactive and ad-hoc support.

In Malaysia, the “1K: I’m In” campaign initially announced in conjunction with Intel Malaysia’s 40th year anniversary celebrations contributed to the largest Intel Involved Matching Grant Program Payout ever – RM930,000.00 or equivalent to over 60,000 volunteer hours contributed all through the year 2012. In recognition of these efforts, the top ten volunteers for 2012 were also presented with an Ultrabook each.

Under the same program, Intel Malaysia employees also participated in the seasonal Festive Cheer programs for the 13th year running; reaching out to 25 needy families in the Kulim and Bukit Mertajam area for the Chinese New Year celebrations and 50 beneficiaries from the Kompleks Warga Emas Darul Hanan, Kepala Batas and 40 other underprivileged families from Penang and Kulim for Hari Raya Aidilfitri. The Hari Raya Aidilfitri giveaway was funded by a donation drive which managed to raise over RM12,000.

In addition to that, Intel Malaysia’s Intel Involved Volunteers were involved in setting up a computer lab for the students of Sekolah Kebangsaan Convent Bukit Mertajam which is set to be equipped with 40 surplus Intel laptops (10 units have already been deployed). The lab itself was also fitted out from scratch from an existing classroom in the school building.

The employees of Intel Malaysia were also involved in its bi-annual Blood Donation Drives with 400 over donors involved at every drive.