The Intel® Evo™ team came together to create world changing tech—advancing the PC platform and bringing new experiences to life with the 11th Gen Intel® Core™ processor. And they couldn’t have done it without the support and inspiration of their coworkers. From engineers and architects to mission control and program managers, building the Intel Evo platform was a true team effort. The 11th gen Intel Core processor has been years in the making, with thousands of engineers around the world working together to fundamentally redesign our CPU process—a technology that only Intel has the unmatched assets to bring to life. Below, a few members of the team share what it is like working at Intel, and on Intel Evo specifically, as they work together to deliver new experiences previously unimaginable.
Stephan Rotter, Senior Principal Engineer
When I was 8 years old, my father brought home an IBM PC with an 8088 Intel CPU. He taught me BASIC programming and at the time, I could not grasp how my keystrokes showed up on a screen—it was magic. I “helped” him install a floppy disk drive and saw the inside of the computer. I was hooked. I had to understand this magic.
I joined Intel as a dream job fresh out of college supporting the tail end of Pentium development in Santa Clara, CA. My career arc took me from Santa Clara to Hudson, MA and finally to Jones Farm, OR. All my roles have been in product development and debug. This job is amazing—working on the leading edge products that touch the lives of people throughout the world and being able to say that I helped make that possible. I find it invigorating that every problem and challenge I face at work, I am doing so with group of engineers who are dedicated to solving it with me with integrity and an unmatched technical depth that challenges me to be a better engineer than I was the prior day.
Now, I’m the technical lead of a 150+ person team developing the manufacturing screens and characterizing the silicon for most optimal power and performance per device. Working on this technology has shown me the pride of “swinging big” on a project and delivering the product with a passionate, driven team of engineers. I would tell anyone looking to get into the field to be humble in the face of data and be hungry to learn—nearly four decades later, though I understand more, it is still magic.
Saranya Sridaran, PNP Principal Engineer
Growing up I always wanted to know how things worked, how things were built. I wanted to fix things around my house, and I had a passion for math. Pentium systems used to be really expensive in India those days, and my friends used to build systems for cheaper than retail. I was challenged by my friends in high school to put together a desktop. And I did. That turned my passion to engineering and microprocessors.
Intel was my dream company to work for when I was in college. I am passionate about hardware and computer architecture and Intel provides opportunities to work with cutting edge technologies across these streams. I joined Intel 13 years ago, and it’s been a wonderful place to be.
As the platform PNP architect and the post-si PnP technical lead on this project, my job was to debug and tune the Intel Evo platform to meet its power and performance targets, and ensure Intel Evo-verified devices are competitive in the market competitive in the market.
My favorite part of working on this project was the people and team – from engineers to great leadership, it is a perfect example of “One Intel.” Working on Intel Evo has encouraged me to exhibit a fearless attitude, made me think outside the box, and provided me with tremendous learning opportunities.
One thing I’ve learned while at Intel is that you need to be aware of what’s going on with competition and use that to propel solutions. Don’t shy away from problems. Make solving problems your forte and always look at the bigger picture.
Pouria Bastani, Design for Test & Debug Director
In third grade, we were asked to draw what we wanted to be when you grow up, my answer was “a computer." As I got into high school, there was an amazing excitement about the revolutionary changes going on at such a fast pace. It really felt like the tech industry was changing the world and I wanted to be a part of that.
Today, in my role at Intel, the team and leaders I get to work with every day keep me energized about my career in engineering. The challenges we face right now are actually the things that excite me the most because I know we’re ready to rise to the occasion.
My role on this project was execution focused, managing the Design for Test & Debug (DFx) team, to ensure that all the design for test features got architected, implemented, and enabled. My team and I worked to enable the test features and content to screen out defective parts during the fabrication and assembly process, and enabled debug features to help speed up debugging to figure out the root-cause of logical issues encountered during system bring-up of the new technology.
Advice I would give for anyone looking to go into this field? Lead with curiosity and never stop learning from the amazing talented people around you. Everyone brings a unique, diverse background and point of view as a whole person. The more curiosity you show, the more people want to help you, and the more connected and effective we'll be in tackling the challenge at hand.
Interested in a career working on world changing tech? Check out our openings here: https://jobs.intel.com/
Team behind Tiger Lake, the project name for the Intel® Evo™ platform.
Photo taken prior to COVID-19.
Photo taken prior to COVID-19.
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