Intel Says It Isn’t Existing Server Motherboard Market

Rumours of Intel leaving the motherboard business have been prevalent over the last 6 months or so and we were firm believers that this was actually the case. It was believed Haswell motherboards would be the last from Intel before it finally scraps making motherboards altogether and focuses on different things. While Intel’s move to withdraw from the consumer motherboard market may still be true (shown by Intel cutting orders for consumer motherboards by 80% for Haswell), Intel has reaffirmed its commitment to server grade motherboards despite rumours suggesting they would exit this market as well.

Softpedia claim that Intel contacted them and make a statement categorically denying their exit from the server motherboard market. The statement reads:

“Intel is committed to our sever board and systems business and will continue to grow volume and revenue year-over-year, just introduced new server motherboards based on the recently launched Intel Xeon Processor E3-1200 v3 Product Family, and we are hitting key development milestones on the next-generation of dual-socket server boards for 2014 and actively planning 2015 products. Intel’s server board and systems business is accelerating and we are looking forward to being the trusted partner to the server channel for many years to come.”

Unlike the consumer motherboard rumour, which Intel has yet to fully comment on, Intel was quick to respond to the server motherboard rumour as to not cause a loss of confidence in its business partners. With this public announcement that Intel isn’t withdrawing from the server motherboard market it remains to be seen whether Intel will exit the consumer market too. While Intel hasn’t made a statement, to me it seems like Intel would continue in the consumer market if they are making motherboards for the server market at the same time. However, even if they did exit it surely wouldn’t be that much of a loss given the large amounts of competition we currently have in the consumer motherboard market.

What are your thoughts on Intel’s statement about their motherboard business?

Image courtesy of eTeknix