Intel said it is beginning to deliver visible results in its foundry business for external customers.

On May 18, CNBC reported that Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan (립부 탄) said in an interview that customer interest is growing and he expects commitments with multiple customers in the second half of this year.

The foundry business is seen as the core of Intel’s turnaround strategy and its most expensive area. Intel has produced chips for PCs and data center servers at its own factories, but it is shifting its business structure toward making semiconductors for external customers as well. The shift also aligns with a strategy to expand advanced semiconductor production in the United States.

Tan called the foundry “one of the country’s core assets” and stressed that Intel’s manufacturing competitiveness is improving in practice. On the 18A advanced process, which investors have watched as a test of the turnaround, he said conditions were not good when he became CEO but progress is now visible.

The key metric for the 18A process is yield. It shows how reliably saleable chips are produced from a single wafer and is directly tied to profitability and customer confidence. Tan said industry best practice is a 7 to 8 percent monthly improvement in yield, and Intel is now showing that pattern. He also assessed Intel’s pace of improvement as exceeding expectations.

Stabilising the process is feeding expectations for orders. Tan said improvements in manufacturing performance have led potential customers to start showing interest in Intel’s foundry business. He did not name customers but said, “Multiple customers are working with us,” adding, “I hope we can support them.”

In the market, whether Intel can secure major external customers has been seen as the biggest point to watch. Intel shares have risen more than 300 percent since Tan became CEO in March 2025. Investors are watching whether Tan, who has worked in the semiconductor industry for a long time, can drive changes to improve a struggling Intel. Central to that is whether Intel Foundry can rise to a level where it can compete with Taiwan’s TSMC.

Intel executives have previously said moves related to external customers will become more concrete from the second half. CFO David Zinsner (데이비드 진스너) said during an earnings announcement in April that activity by external foundry customers is expected to become clearer between the second half of this year and early 2027.

The business is linked not only to improvements in Intel’s performance but also to U.S. semiconductor supply-chain strategy. Tan said more than 90 percent of cutting-edge processors are produced outside the United States and stressed the importance of bringing some production back to the country. Intel has built a new factory in Arizona applying the 18A process, and production at the Ohio project is expected to start no earlier than 2030 after major delays.

Intel also mentioned its next-generation 14A process. Tan assessed 14A as a long-term basis for competing with TSMC. He called it a “major breakthrough,” saying the 14A schedule would be aligned around a similar time as TSMC’s. Whether Intel can turn 18A stabilisation and external-customer wins into actual contracts is seen as a key variable that will decide the success or failure of its foundry strategy.