Intel shares jumped more than nine percent Monday after The Information reported Google ordered over three million artificial intelligence chips from the US foundry for production in 2028.
A note of caution belongs up front: Intel declined to comment, Alphabet and Nvidia did not immediately respond, and Reuters said it could not independently verify the account. If accurate, though, the order would be the largest known customer commitment to Intel’s contract manufacturing business and a direct challenge to the dominance of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) in advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip production.
The order concerns Google’s tensor processing units (TPUs), custom chips the company designs for training and running advanced AI models. Google committed after months of testing Intel’s advanced packaging, the technology that stitches multiple chip dies and high bandwidth memory into a single module, and that detail explains the whole story. TSMC’s industry standard packaging process has been oversubscribed for more than two years, leaving chip designers hunting for a second source. Memory maker SK hynix is separately testing whether its high bandwidth memory runs reliably on Intel’s packaging.
The stakes for Google are large because TPU demand has exploded. Customers now include Citadel Securities, all 17 US Energy Department national laboratories and Anthropic, which has pledged to use multiple gigawatts of TPU capacity, while a February agreement gave Meta multiyear access to the chips. Morgan Stanley estimates Google’s TPU buildout across 2027 and 2028 exceeds six million units, which would make the Intel order a substantial share of the pipeline.
For Intel, the report validates a turnaround few predicted. Chief executive Lip-Bu Tan spent much of last year repairing the balance sheet through external investment, and the company has since expanded its Google partnership on data centre processors and signed onto Elon Musk’s Terafab chip project. Intel’s stock has risen 441 percent from its one year low, lifting its market value to roughly $557 billion.
More business may follow. Nvidia is evaluating whether Intel can manufacture a future processor that fuses four graphics dies into one unit, tied to its Feynman architecture due in 2028, though it has placed no order.
Confirmation from Intel or Google, or its absence in coming days, will show whether the market’s enthusiasm ran ahead of the facts.
