Intel Hires Samsung’s Shawn Han For Foundry Services Amid Strategic Pivot

• Han, an executive vice president at Samsung, has three decades of experience at the South Korean company, with his most recent experience spanning sales at its Foundry business. 
• The leadership announcement comes shortly after Intel unveiled a strategic partnership with SpaceX, xAI, and Tesla to advance the development of next-generation silicon fabrication technology.
• INTC shares have had a powerful rally, up for a third consecutive week as investors turn optimistic on the company’s pivot.

Intel Corp. (INTC) has hired Samsung’s Foundry head Shawn Han to lead its own Foundry Services as it pivots from being just a chipmaker into the broader fabrication ecosystem.

According to a post on LinkedIn from Naga Chandrasekaran, executive vice president, chief technology and operations officer, and general manager of the Intel Foundry organization, Han will report to him after joining the company in May.

The leadership announcement comes shortly after Intel unveiled a strategic partnership with SpaceX, xAI, and Tesla Inc. (TSLA) to advance the development of next-generation silicon fabrication technology.

Leadership Update

Han, an executive vice president at Samsung, has three decades of experience at the South Korean company, with his most recent experience spanning sales at its Foundry business.

As per Han’s LinkedIn profile, he has been leading Samsung’s U.S. team for the last three years. He joined Samsung Electronics in 1996 as a senior engineer, gaining experience in device and process integration engineering, before going on to head Customer Engineering for Samsung’s Foundry Business. 

“Shawn’s leadership will be an important addition to our team, and he is joining at an exciting time as we continue to execute on process technology, advanced packaging, and our overall foundry capabilities,” Chandrasekaran said in his post.

Foundry Push

Intel’s foundry business is a key strategic pivot for CEO Lip-Bu Tan. In the last earnings call, Tan said that the company remained “focused on the long-term objective of building a world-class wafer and advanced packaging foundry,” although it would take time.

The company has, however, begun shipping its first products built on Intel 18A, its own semiconductor manufacturing process, and Intel Foundry also met key 18A and 14A milestones in the previous quarter.

Moreover, under the new deal for the Terafab initiative, a semiconductor facility that is a joint effort between Tesla and SpaceX, Intel will serve as the manufacturing backbone, supplying advanced semiconductor fabrication capabilities to support AI, robotics, and space technologies. By combining design and manufacturing expertise, Intel has positioned itself as a central foundry partner in scaling Musk’s next-generation computing ecosystem.

INTC Rally And Retail Reaction

INTC shares have had a powerful rally, up for a third consecutive week as investors turn optimistic on the company’s pivot. INTC stock was up about 5% on Thursday at the time of writing, pushing weekly gains to over 9%.

Meanwhile, on Stocktwits, retail sentiment around INTC shares was in the ‘extremely bullish’ territory over the past 24 hours amid ‘high’ message volumes.

One bullish user predicted that the company’s shares would hit $100 soon. INTC shares were trading around $68.18 at the time of writing.

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