Intel CEO calls for federal help to solve production shortage

Intel CEO Brian Krzanich tells Melissa Francis of FBN that the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) needs to step up its game to solve America’s growing shortage of computer chips.

Krzanich’s comments come after a news report by CNBC this week claimed that manufacturers are having trouble keeping up with the demand for PC chips. The problem is affecting everyone from retailers to brick-and-mortar retailers to those putting together coffee makers, scanners and other devices that use microprocessors.

Intel made headlines earlier this year when it became the first company in 50 years to sell a billion microprocessors. The company is currently producing 95% of the microprocessors used in computers worldwide, and it’s the most used microprocessor in the entire world.

“We’ve got this huge time-to-market advantage, this great intellectual property advantage, which is why we are playing so well in the market,” Krzanich said on the program. “But then we’ve got this shortage right now. So someone is going to have to be a catch up for it and I think we’ve got to have NIST lead it.”

A manufacturing shortage is bad news for every company involved in computer chips, including Intel. The massive backlog of chips is not just impacting U.S. manufacturers, however, Krzanich says, but worldwide supply chains. “It’s really setting us back,” he said.

How to solve the problem? Krzanich says he thinks what needs to happen is something NIST already is doing and can continue to do, which is a constant flow of engineers coming in from the National Academy of Engineering to fill some of the void left by the shortage. “I think what they need to do is not only have them come for the trip but stay for the whole four years,” he said.

“I’m just going to tell you how we did it at Intel,” Krzanich added. “The guys in this audience and this audience in general, our job was to make sure we consistently kept them engaged. I don’t want to have our engineers feel like it’s always 30 degrees outside at this company so they’re always going to go home and do a math problem.”

Krzanich’s comments come on the heels of a very busy week for Intel, with their CEO being named to the National Board of International Affairs at NIST as well as discussing moves to increase their presence in the Washington D.C. market.

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