4 More Changes Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan Made To His Executive Team

CRN details four previously unreported changes Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan made to his executive team, which includes giving new responsibilities to CFO David Zinsner, naming longtime company engineer Pushkar Ranade as Tan’s chief of staff as well as making Intel’s chief communications officer and Intel Capital’s leader direct reports.

When Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan told employees last Thursday that he is creating a “flatter structure” for his executive leadership team, he spelled out several changes.

Outlined in a memo seen by CRN, these changes included making Intel’s business units, such as the Client Computing Group and Data Center Group, report directly to him; naming Network and Edge Group leader Sachin Katti the new chief technology and AI officer; and making three veteran technical leaders report directly to him, as Reuters first reported.

The leader also said he would make the company’s next head of government affairs a direct report after the last person in that role reported to Chief Legal Officer April Miller Boise.

But Tan, who became Intel’s CEO last month, laid out a few other, previously unreported changes to Intel’s executive team that he said would also help reduce hierarchy, enable “faster decision-making” and set “clear accountability.”

These changes include giving new responsibilities to CFO David Zinsner, naming longtime company engineer Pushkar Ranade as Tan’s chief of staff as well as making Chief Communications Officer Jeff Dahncke and Intel Capital leader Anthony Lin direct reports.

Tan also announced Victoria Holroyd-Fogg, vice president of human resources in the company’s products group, as Intel’s interim chief people officer. Her predecessor, Christy Pambianchi, is leaving for the top human resources job at Caterpillar Inc.

The existing executive team members who saw no changes to their roles and responsibilities consisted of Intel Foundry leaders Naga Chandrasekaran and Kevin O’Buckley.

The executive team changes were announced before Bloomberg on Tuesday reported that Intel will announce plans this week to reduce its workforce by more than 20 percent. The company declined to comment on Bloomberg’s report.

In his memo last Thursday, Tan said the executive team “will be working together in the coming weeks and months to drive the cultural transformation needed to position our business for future success.” He added that Intel “will be transparent about any changes we make and the reasons we are making them.”

While Intel did not respond to a request for comment for this story, the company said in a statement last Friday in response to Reuters’ report: “We continue to focus on fostering a culture of innovation across the company that empowers our engineering teams to create great products and delight our customers.”

What follows are details of the executive team changes made by Tan that have not been previously reported, from Zinsner’s new responsibilities to Tan’s other new direct reports.

CFO Takes Over Corporate Development, Global IT Teams

Intel CFO David Zinsner will see his responsibilities expand to include the company’s corporate development and global IT organizations, according to Tan’s memo.

Corporate development had been led by Matt Poirer, who sat on the executive leadership team as a senior vice president. Tan said Poirer, who joined Intel in 2022 from AMD, “has chosen to pursue a new opportunity outside the company.”

“Matt has led a range of important work during his time with Intel and we wish him continued success,” Tan wrote in his memo.

According to Poirer’s biography that is still accessible on Intel’s website, the executive was responsible “for advancing and accelerating Intel’s business through strategic corporate development, including all aspects of mergers and acquisitions, divestitures, and integration activities for the company.”

Responsibility for Intel’s global IT organization previously belonged to now-former Intel CTO Greg Lavender, according to his biography. Tan said Lavender is retiring and has been succeeded by Sachin Katti, Intel’s newly named chief technology and AI officer.

Communications Head To Report Directly To CEO

The head of Intel’s Global Communications and Events Group, Jeff Dahncke, will now report directly to the CEO, according to Tan’s memo.

The communications group was previously part of Intel’s Sales and Marketing Group, which will continue to be led by Chief Commercial Officer Christoph Schell.

Tan said he made the decision to turn Dahncke into a direct report “given the cross-company work this team leads aligned with our overall business priorities.”

Dahncke became Intel’s chief communications officer in January. He joined the company last March as vice president of corporate reputation after previously working at HP Inc. in communications leadership roles for more than six years.

Intel Capital Leader To Report Directly To CEO

The leader of Intel Capital, Anthony Lin, will now report directly to the CEO after previously serving as a direct report to Intel Chief Strategy Officer Saf Yeboah-Amankwah, Tan said.

Intel announced in January that Intel Capital, its venture capital arm that has over $5 billion in assets under management, would become a standalone fund in the second half of this year. Intel is expected to remain a key investor and partner.

“The existing Intel Capital team will move to the new company, and business operations will continue as normal throughout the transition,” Intel said at the time.

Founded in 1991, Intel Capital has “invested in over 1,800 companies and deployed more than $20 billion in capital,” according to the company.

Yeboah-Amankwah will continue to serve as Intel’s chief strategy officer, according to Tan’s memo. The role includes responsibilities for growth-oriented strategies such as strategic partnerships, equity investments and incubation initiatives.

Tan Names Intel Veteran Engineer His Chief Of Staff

Tan said he has appointed longtime company engineer Pushkar Ranade as his chief of staff and technology advisor.

According to Ranade’s LinkedIn profile, he has worked at Intel for more than 17 years across two stints. From 2003 to 2010, he served as a staff engineer, during which he led the development of the 22-nanometer PMOS Tri-Gate transistor, among other things.

Ranade then worked at semiconductor company SuVolta Inc. as vice president of technology development, for which he led development of a “novel low-power transistor company from concept through volume ramp.”

He then returned to Intel in 2015 through its acquisition of Altera, for which he led a 7-nanometer pathfinding “program to evaluate technology options for advanced FPGA products” Intel sold a majority stake of Altera to Silver Lake this month.

Ranade’s most recent title is senior principal engineer for central technology and pathfinding, according to his LinkedIn profile. His responsibilities included the defining of Intel’s future process technologies and product architectures; driving “design-technology co-optimization to improve performance, power [and] cost for Intel’s computing products” and doing a “competitive analysis of the silicon technology and manufacturing landscape.”