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Former Qualcomm Executive Touts Intel’s 5G Ambitions

Intel Corp. sees a significant role for itself in the ultrafast, fifth-generation wireless communications system due out in the next few years. The business “intends to play a unique role in the end-to-end deployment of 5G,” said Murthy Renduchintala, the second-highest ranking executive with the Silicon Valley chip maker.

Renduchintala’s name should be familiar in the San Diego tech community, and the executive is very familiar with the direction that wireless technology is taking. Until recently, he was co-chief of Qualcomm Inc.’s chip making unit. Intel hired Renduchintala away with a compensation package worth $25 million.

He made his first public appearance as an Intel executive at that company’s developer forum Aug. 17 in San Francisco.

In addition to sending copious amounts of data very quickly, 5G wireless technology is expected to drastically cut latency, or the lag time between signals. Renduchintala and those who shared the stage with him talked of firefighter communication systems or factory automation safety systems using 5G technology.

“Services of the future are going to be so much more intolerant of latency because of the types of decisions we are relying on being made in our networks,” Renduchintala told his audience during a panel discussion. In some cases, those decisions could save a life.

Intel reported revenue of $55.4 billion in 2015, down almost 1 percent from $55.9 billion in 2014. Behind the scenes, Renduchintala has reportedly criticized Intel’s pace and its customer focus in developing its chips.

Intel wants to break into the market for wireless device chips — territory firmly held by Qualcomm — while also offering chips for cloud computing. Meanwhile, Qualcomm’s new business unit, Qualcomm Datacenter Technologies Inc., is working to bring cloud computing chips to market soon under the name Qualcomm Centriq.

An Intel securities filing from February offered details of Renduchintala’s new compensation package.

His base salary will be $900,000, according to an offer letter dated Nov. 17.

Renduchintala is in line to get an $8.1 million hiring bonus (three installments of $2.7 million, spread over two years) and another $8.1 million worth of restricted stock units. The Silicon Valley company said it was granting the bonus and stock “[i]n recognition of the equity and cash-based compensation you will be forfeiting by joining Intel.”

Intel also offered a menu of benefits including town car service and help in relocating from his home in Orange County.

• • •

This Ballpark Thinks: A baseball stadium can gobble up a lot of energy and slurp a lot of water. Qualcomm Intelligent Solutions Inc. and OSIsoft LLC are helping the San Diego Padres make Petco Park more efficient by using Internet of Things technologies. Software from OSIsoft, based in the San Francisco Bay community of San Leandro, takes data from “edge intelligence gateways” (powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon processors) to inform the resource-saving effort. The goal is to reduce operational expenses by 25 percent over the next five years.

• • •

Texas Connects: Ingenu Inc., the Scripps Ranch company rolling out a wireless network for the Internet of Things, announced on Aug. 17 that it has expanded that network to Austin, San Antonio and Houston.

One week earlier, the network operator announced availability in Phoenix, where 10 access points cover more than 1,850 square miles. Ingenu said that its network offers low-power, wide area connectivity, meant for machine-to-machine communication only. One of Ingenu’s access points has the range of 10 to 30 conventional cell towers, the company said.

The company said it uses 27 access points to reach the Austin, San Antonio and Houston markets and outlying areas.

• • •

Ride the Red Cars: People who would like to ditch the Southern California automobile habit will be glad to learn that Apple Maps now features San Diego train and trolley routes, with departure times. All you need is an Apple smartphone or tablet running iOS 9. Unfortunately for suburban dwellers like me, the feature will not make the transit system as convenient as it is in New York or Chicago — but the feature will help you find a place to park in Mission Valley and hop on the trolley to a baseball game at Petco Park. Apple Maps’ transit feature is available in about 30 cities in the Americas, Europe and Australia, and about 300 cities in China. Want to gloat while riding transit? Apple Maps can show San Diego’s freeway congestion.

• • •

More Transit Tech: Cubic Corp. (NYSE: CUB) said early this month that it signed a $33 million deal to take the Miami transit system’s card-based fare collection system into the cloud. The deal includes 10 years of back office cloud computing and support services.

Send San Diego technology news to bradg@sdbj.com.

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