decades of partnership

Interview with Pat Gelsinger

More than half of Intel’s revenue comes through a group called the Digital Enterprise Group. Pat Gelsinger (MS 1985 EE), is a senior vice president and co-general manager of that group.

When Gelsinger was a Stanford student, his advisor was a young computer architect, John Hennessy, who is now the university’s president.

What are the most important connections between Intel and Stanford today, both in research and among people?

Each of the senior technologists at Intel would clearly argue theirs is the most important connection to Stanford Professors and students, but we clearly view the work in nanostructures, parallel computing, and visual computing to be some of the most critical areas.

Why has Stanford remained important to Intel?

We have a very competitive process for our research grants. There is no top down mandate to support Stanford vs. any other school. Each research grant is determined by our lead researcher in that particular area who is simply out to have the best partner possible. Thus, the reason Stanford has the most support is that they’ve earned it by having the best researchers and best collaborative projects for us to invest in.

How has Intel viewed Stanford’s role in the industry?

Stanford has a great reputation at Intel. Many of our key technologists hail from Stanford so a bit of Cardinal pride permeates the ranks of our most senior leaders. Further, we’ve had great results from the collaboration. We even have a Board member, Jim Plummer, from Stanford. Finally, my former advisor and friend John Hennessy is well known at Stanford and at Intel as well.

Has the relationship between Stanford and Intel evolved as the company has grown?

Simply, as Intel has grown so has the relationship. For almost every area that Intel is doing work we can point to significant collaboration and research projects with Stanford. Traditionally, these have been focused in semiconductor materials and device structures as well as computing architectures and programming systems. More recently as Intel has taken a leadership role in graphics and visualization, we’ve launched significant activities in this area as well.

How strong is the Stanford Engineering alumni community is at Intel?

There are almost 1000 alumni from Stanford at Intel today. Stanford is one of the focus schools for Intel and we’d hope all the top graduates land at Intel.

In general, have Stanford engineering graduates stood out in any way from the standpoint of recruiting?

Stanford graduates are some of the most sought after at Intel. Generally, there are strong relationships with many of the faculty and many students have been interns with us. Thus, in many cases, it is often a very natural progression to have graduates join the Intel family

When you were a Stanford student, John Hennessy was your advisor. What are some of your favorite memories of your Stanford days?

I recall an argument that John and I had about CISC (complex instruction set code) vs. RISC (reduced instruction set code). He said that a CISC machine “would never break 2 clocks per instruction”. I knew that in just a couple of weeks we’d break this mark when launching the 80486 at 1.8 Clocks per Instruction, I was delighted to prove my teacher wrong.

We also had public debates on CISC vs. RISC. The most well known was at a Bear Stearns investor conference chronicled by Microprocessor Report. It had perfect dynamics, corporation vs. university, teacher vs. student, new idea vs. old and proven technology. At one point John was a bit frustrated with my sharp reply and said “whose student are you anyway!”

What are some ways in which you personally remain connected to Stanford?

I periodically come onto campus, occasionally give some lectures, stay connected to some of the professors, try to see John when I get the chance, and engage some of the faculty as consultants on some key topics and strategies.

How do you imagine Intel and Stanford working together in the future?

I’d hope to see even more areas of collaboration. I’d like to see a broader intellectual property engagement enabling an Intel lab at the Stanford campus. I’d like to see some of our research programs result in fundamental breakthroughs for the industry.