Intel hypes ecommerce, wireless networks
Summary Description Intel no longer wants to be
known as just a processor company.
Author
Publication
Roullas Top10 Simon Vandore
Newswire
No
Editorial InformationArticle Location
http://www.newswire.com.au/0002/intel1.htm
Article Topic Ecommerce, Processors
Story Order
Story Group 000220
Post Date 18/02/2000 05:18 PM Status Posted Entered by Roulla
Yiacoumi on 18/02/2000 03:33 PM
ImagesLead Picture
Heading Image
Content
Introduction
At its biannual conference this week, Intel has tried to
reposition itself as a manufacturer of products for the Internet
and electronic commerce, rather than just a processor company.
Body
Ebusiness was the strongest theme of the Intel Developer Forum
(IDF) keynotes in Palm Springs, California, and Intel's own
online business was the primary example -- the company claims to
have done $US13 billion worth of trade online last year.
Perhaps in reference to the Pentium III chip shortage which has
plagued Intel in recent months, general manager of the Intel
architecture business group, Paul Otellini said that by
increasing its focus in taking orders online, Intel would be able
to change its build plan within three days and it would become
unnecessary to maintain inventory.
Otellini also said ebusiness should become customer-centric
instead of vendor-centric, with customers using applications that
gather and sort information from all their suppliers at once.
Intel will produce network cards featuring a security
co-processor, in an attempt to reduce the weight SSL security
places on CPUs in Internet transaction processing. This often
causes long delays when a customer places an online order, and
Intel quoted Zona Research findings that customers will typically
wait only eight seconds before hitting the 'stop' button on an
online order.
The company has adopted IPSec, a standard defined by the Internet
Engineering Task Force (IETF) for routing and switching encrypted
packets on any IP network, which is transparent to applications
and is best implemented at network card level. Christensen
predicted such hardware-level security would become "a de
facto part of any network" in the future.
The company also threw its weight behind XML as an important
factor in the success of ebusiness, maintaining that the
interoperability of data at all points on the ebusiness chain is
vital to getting the most out of the online environment.
"XML is as important to ebusiness as HTML was to the
Web," Gelsinger said.
Wireless networks
Also high on Intel's agenda is the wireless network. The company
has announced a $US100 million investment in Symbol, currently
the world's biggest 802.11 wireless product manufacturer, which
was the first to produce barcode scanning systems for
supermarkets. The two companies will work together on wireless
computing products using the 2.4GHz and 5.2GHz bands under
Intel's AnyPoint wireless Ethernet brand.
Ultimately Intel expects AnyPoint will use 802.11a at 5.2GHz. The
first products will appear in the second quarter of this year.
General manager of Intel's network communications group, Mark
Christensen, said he expects radio-frequency wireless LANs will
be 'the primary deployed home networking solution' of the next
five years. He predicted there will be 20 million networks in US
homes by 2005, but said consumers should not even need to know
that they have a network in their house; the Internet should be
available in every room, like electricity. Christensen urged PC
manufacturers in his audience to offer networking as a standard
part of every PC shipped. He also predicted that gigabit ethernet
over copper is about a year away.
The AnyPoint drivers will also feature a small piece of software
which sits in the Windows system tray and allows users to switch
between networks at will (such as when moving a notebook PC from
an office environment to the home) -- a feature which is lacking
from current versions of Windows.
Later at the conference Intel demonstrated Ambler, its
implementation of Bluetooth, the emerging short-range standard
for 2.4GHz data exchange between wireless devices. However, the
current Ambler prototype only operates at a few kilobits per
second, as opposed to the intended final speed of 1Mbps.
Simon Vandore travelled to the Intel Developer Forum as a guest
of Intel.
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Bulletin SummaryIntel hypes ecommerce, wireless networks
At its biannual conference this week, Intel has tried to
reposition itself as a manufacturer of products for the Internet
and electronic commerce, rather than just a processor company.
Ebusiness was the strongest theme of the Intel Developer Forum
(IDF) keynotes in Palm Springs, California, and Intel's own
online business was the primary example -- the company claims to
have done $US13 billion worth of trade online last year. Also
high on Intel's agenda is the wireless network. The company has
announced a $US 100 million investment in Symbol, currently the
world's biggest 802.11 wireless product manufacturer, which was
the first to produce barcode scanning systems for supermarkets.
The two companies will work together on wireless computing
products using the 2.4GHz and 5.2GHz bands under Intel's AnyPoint
wireless Ethernet brand.
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Intel hypes ecommerce, wireless networks
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