Apple's Mac architecture lead moves to Intel

Jeff Wilcox was formerly at Intel from 2010 - 2013, but spent the last eight years helping Apple reinvent its approach to silicon

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Jeff Wilcox was formerly at Intel from 2010 - 2013, but spent the last eight years helping Apple reinvent its approach to silicon

Tech giants are in the middle of a hiring war, offering substantial bonuses to keep and attract top talent

Jeff Wilcox, Apple's director of Mac system architecture, has left the world's first trillion-dollar company in favour of a new role at Intel.

Wilcox first announced the change on LinkedIn, saying he had decided to leave Apple after "an amazing eight years" and was pursuing another opportunity. At the time, he did not say where he was going.

"It has been an incredible ride and I could not be prouder of all we accomplished during my time there, culminating in the Apple Silicon transition with the M1, M1 Pro and M1 Max SOCs and systems," Wilcox said.

"I will dearly miss all of my Apple colleagues and friends, but I am looking forward to the next journey which will start at the first of the year. More to come!"

In a new post on Thursday, Wilcox writes: "I'm pleased to share that I have started a new position as Intel Fellow, Design Engineering Group CTO, Client SoC Architecture at Intel Corporation. I could not be more thrilled to be back working with the amazing teams there to help create groundbreaking SOCs.

"Great things are ahead!"

Wilcox oversaw Apple's transition to its own silicon during his eight-year tenure, including Apple's own M1 chip, which was praised for its high performance and efficiency.

The Apple M1 is the first ARM-based SoC the company has used in its MacBook lineup of laptops, as well as its compact Mac models running macOS. The ARM design allowed the iPhone maker to end its previous dependence on Intel CPUs.

It is not known whether Apple tried to retain Wilcox. The company has reportedly been offering bonuses as high as $180,000 to engineers to prevent them leaving.

For Wilcox, the move marks a return to Intel, where he worked as a principal engineer from October 2010 to November 2013. He has also previously worked at Nvidia as a principal architect.

Intel has almost certainly hired Wilcox to develop SoCs based on the x86 architecture.

This is just one of Intel's recent hires from key competitors such as Nvidia, AMD, and Apple, all of which have come under Pat Gelsinger's guidance, who became Intel CEO in January 2021. The company has also modified its compensation structure in the last 12 months, with a $2.4 billion investment focused on attracting new talent.