From complacency to collaboration: how Intel can learn from the Dao

3 min readSep 4, 2024

How did Intel get itself into such dire straits that it has asked leading investment banks to examine its future strategic options? For decades, the company was synonymous with PC microprocessors and the most powerful player in the semiconductor industry. Now it is scrambling hard to hold on to its PC and server market share against a resurgent AMD and emerging Qualcomm while Nvidia has shot past it to become the overall industry leader with its dominance of the AI semiconductor space.

While there are a lot of technical reasons why Intel fell behind, the key factor is the insular culture that the company developed after its glory days under Andy Grove. Despite his warnings that “only the paranoid survive”, the company grew far too complacent and lost touch with the changing needs of its customers as smartphones replaced the PC as the primary computing device for the vast majority of the global population.

Although Intel still has great technology and competitive new products such as its new Lunar Lake AI PC processors, the company needs to nurture a much more open and flexible culture if it is to survive and thrive in the highly competitive global semiconductor market.

Building a sense of humility is essential if Intel is to cooperate more effectively with its supply chain partners and customers. Rather than putting itself above them, the company would be well advised to follow the counsel of the Daodejing and place itself below them by acting like water as described in Chapter 8 of the text:

The highest good is like water.
Water benefits the myriad things.
It does not contend.
It settles in places
That people disdain.
It is akin to the Dao.

Getting back to basics is a second key principle from the Daodejing that Intel should follow. Rather than overhyping its latest advances, the company would be better off working quietly in the background to resolve the issues it faces. As Chapter 22 points out, true effectiveness comes through modesty and effortless action (wuwei) rather than attempting to stand out or impress others.

The sage embraces the one,
Is a model for all-under-heaven.
He does not show off,
And therefore shines.
He does not promote himself,
And is therefore revered.
He does not boast,
And therefore accomplishes.
He does not seek glory,
And therefore endures.

Adopting a more flexible and open attitude will also be critical if Intel is to recover from its missteps. Now that it is no longer number one in the market, the company will need to learn to collaborate more closely with its customers and supply chain partners than it did before. Although Intel has made some progress in acknowledging that reality under its CEO Gelsinger, it still has a long way to go in accepting and acting on it. As Chapter 78 of the Daodejing points out:

The gentle overcomes the strong.
The soft overcomes the hard.
All-under-heaven
Knows this truth,
Yet no one applies it.

From complacency to collaboration: how Intel can learn from the Dao

Written by Richard Brown