April 15, 2026Updated April 20, 2026, 11:29 a.m. ET
This story is part of the Iconic Brands series, a USA TODAY network project showcasing the companies and brands that helped shape the nation’s identity, economy and culture. The series celebrates American ingenuity with a deeply reported examination of how brands intersect with history, community and everyday life in celebration of the nation’s 250th anniversary. Find more at https://usatoday.com/usa250/iconic-brands
Semiconductors are the electronic brains of a computer, and they are used in everything from washing machines to weapons.
They are vital to our technology-dependent existence, and Intel has been an innovative, chip-producing giant for decades.
Founded in 1968, Intel designs, produces and sells a variety of computer components to businesses and consumers.
Included are the tiny transistors that revolutionized the tech industry, making the company a modern-day Ford. The company was known for regularly producing faster and more powerful chips to keep pace with the warp-speed changes and demands of technology.
In 2024, Intel was reported to be the third-largest semiconductor chip manufacturer in the world by revenue and has made a regular appearance on the Forbes 500 list of the biggest companies in the United States for nearly the last 20 years.
Still, despite its past successes and reputation as one of the most impactful companies in American history, Intel is also troubled, hindered by its inability to recognize and embrace the popularity of smartphones and the non-negotiable presence of Artificial Intelligence.
Intel – based in Santa Clara, California – has become another stark reminder to those in Silicon Valley and beyond: Even the giants can fall from grace when adaptation is not visualized, nor urgently prioritized.
In August 2025, Intel gave the United States government a 10% stake in the company worth $8.9 billion.
It was considered to be one of the largest government interventions of a company in the United States since the bailout of the auto industry in 2008. The government poured billions of dollars into Chrysler and General Motors to avoid what could have been a devastating economic collapse
President Donald Trump announced the Intel deal shortly after meeting with Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan – the company’s third leader in the past five years.
“I said, ‘I think it would be good having the United States as your partner.”’ Trump said of his discussion with Tan. “He agreed, and they’ve agreed to do it. And I think it’s a great deal for them.”
In addition to Intel, the U.S. government also has stakes in U.S. Steel and MP Materials, which is a large American mining company.
The $8.9 billion investment was in addition to the $2.2 billion the United States government gave to Intel under what is known as the CHIPS and Science Act.
That was signed into law in 2022 to provide grant money to companies as an attempt to reignite semiconductor development and manufacturing in the U.S.
The government does not have a seat on Intel’s board of directors despite the sizable stake it acquired.
“We are grateful for the confidence the President and the administration have placed in Intel, and we look forward to working to advance U.S. technology and manufacturing leadership,” Tan said in a statement.
In a post on social media, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said the deal was “historic” in nature and predicted it would help cement the country as leaders in producing semiconductors.
Intel was founded in 1968 by Gordon Moore, a chemist, Arthur Rock, an investor, and Robert Noyce, a physicist. It was Noyce who invented the microchip, and Moore who correctly predicted the impact it would eventually have.
The company was originally going to be called “Moore Noyce’” but the founders thought it sounded too similar to “more noise” and that would lead to consumers relating the name to the unpleasant sounds related to bad interference.
They eventually changed it to Intel, which stood for “Integrated Electronics.” Since the name “Intel” was already trademarked by a hotel chain, the founders had to purchase the rights to it.
Intel became one of the first companies to appear on NASDAQ.
Memory chips – made from silicon and store short-term data – were the company’s earliest products. Intel later invented microprocessors, which perform calculations, and the U.S. government was among the first customers.
Almost immediately, Intel distinguished itself for its ability to produce logic circuits using semiconductor devices, and by 1973 the company had produced what was called the “1103.”
It was the biggest selling semiconductor memory chip in the world.
However, it was not until the 1980’s – when personal computers appeared on the market in the United States – that Intel’s business model became focused almost entirely on memory chips.
Intel’s success only grew when it struck a deal to have chips inside IBM computers.
That would lead to a groundbreaking partnership with Microsoft Windows – known as Wintel – that dominated the computer landscape. Almost every computer in the world consisted of Intel hardware and Windows software, making the two companies among the world’s biggest.
“Intel Inside” stickers on computers were as common as Nike swooshes on shoes.
Intel had become so wildly successful that President Barack Obama’s administration filed an antitrust suit against the company in 2009. The case was settled in August 2010, and it did little to impact Intel’s massive profit margin.
Not that mistakes weren’t made.
Intel, led by former CEO Paul Otellini, turned down an offer from Apple to make chips for the first iPhone.
Otellini was Intel’s CEO from 2005 to 2013. He passed away four years after leaving the company.
“We ended up not winning it or passing on it, depending on how you want to view it. And the world would have been a lot different if we’d done it,” Otellini said in a 2013 interview with The Atlantic.
“The thing you have to remember is that this was before the iPhone was introduced and no one knew what the iPhone would do,” Otellini said.
“At the end of the day, there was a chip that they were interested in that they wanted to pay a certain price for and not a nickel more and that price was below our forecasted cost.”
In hindsight, Otellini said he should have “followed (his) gut” when it came to making a deal with Apple.
“My gut told me to say yes,” Otellini said.
Despite that monumental decision, Intel’s revenue still increased nearly $20 billion during Otellini’s tenure as CEO. And the iPhone failure did not entirely deter Intel from being a visionary company.
For example, Intel has been a big player in the autonomous driving wars. This was evidenced in 2017, when the company purchased Mobileye for $15 billion. Mobileye essentially pioneered cameras on cars, creating features such as lane-keeping assistance and adaptive cruise control, precursors to cars driving themselves.
Brian Krzanich took over for Otellini and tried to make up for the Apple miscue by spending billions developing a modern chip for the iPhone – a venture that failed.
Krzanich was forced out in 2018 after it was revealed he had a relationship with an employee.
By 2019, Samsung had overtaken Intel as the leader in semiconductor manufacturing.
As The New York Times noted in a 2025 story, the up-and-down fortunes of a Silicon Valley giant such as Intel is not necessarily a complicated formula.
Often, you have visionary founders with an abundance of energy and innovative ideas capable of changing the world, and sometimes they even do, the Times story noted.
But when those visionaries leave, many companies miss out on the next big thing. That’s when the upstarts take over, and the once-revolutionary companies face the risk of becoming relics.
In 2021, then-Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger tried to jumpstart the company’s quest to regain world chip dominance, in part by lobbying President Joe Biden’s administration to push through the CHIPS and Science Act.
The CHIPS and Science Act, which Congress passed in 2022, set aside $50 billion for the struggling chip making industry in the United States.
Gelsinger, according to The New York Times, committed more than $100 billion to chip manufacturing using facilities in Arizona, Oregon, New Mexico and Ohio.
In November 2025, Intel fired Gelsinger as ChatGPT – an artificial intelligence system – exploded and cloud computing companies flocked to Nvidia, Intel’s rival, to use its chips.
Gelsinger was replaced by Tan in March 2025 to revive Intel again.
But Tan was only on the job for a few months before President Trump called for his ouster, citing Tan’s investments in Chinese semiconductor companies.
Many view China as an adversary of the United States.
In addition, Trump opposed the CHIPS and Science Act, which he called “a horrible, horrible thing.”
Tan met with Trump, and a deal was finalized: The United States received a 10% stake in Intel in exchange for the CHIPS funding it had received.
And Tan kept his job.
Nvidia, meanwhile, has now become the most valuable company in the world, worth an estimated $4.5 trillion. Intel, which once towered over Nvidia, is worth $227 billion.
And now, as Tan attempts to awaken what was once a Silicon Valley giant, more obstacles have surfaced.
Several U.S. senators have questioned whether Intel used technology from a blacklisted Chinese producer of semiconductor tools.
In a letter sent to Tan, Republican and Democratic lawmakers have questioned whether using tools from the Chinese subsidiary of the company, ACM Research, would create national security risks.
The main concern is whether this would potentially allow China to gain access to Intel’s chip making processes. Adding to the concern is the fact Intel is now partly owned by United States taxpayers.
“Intel’s entanglements with blacklisted Chinese companies calls into question whether taxpayer dollars are subsidizing activities that could directly threaten U.S. national security and leadership in semiconductor manufacturing,” the senators wrote.
Six senators signed the letter, including Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat from Massachusetts, and Tom Cotton, a Republican from Arkansas.
They asked Intel to answer questions such as whether it has tested ACM tools; what safeguards it has to protect chip making; and what mechanisms it has to make sure taxpayer money doesn’t inadvertently flow to China.
Intel has publicly stated that ACM tools aren’t used in its semiconductor manufacturing processes.
The Iconic Brands 50 identifies American companies that most profoundly shaped the nation’s identity, economy and culture. Selection emphasized historical significance, industry-building innovation, measurable economic influence and lasting cultural impact. Brands were chosen for transforming daily life or becoming enduring symbols of American values. Long-term relevance and sustained national influence carried greater weight than short-term financial performance or recent popularity.
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