President Donald Trump demanded today that the new boss of US chip maker Intel resign “immediately”, after a Republican senator raised national security concerns over his links to firms in China.
“The CEO of INTEL is highly CONFLICTED and must resign, immediately. There is no other solution to this problem,” Trump posted on his Truth Social platform, a day after senator Tom Cotton said he had written to Intel questioning ties between CEO Lip-Bu Tan and Chinese firms.
Tan “reportedly controls dozens of Chinese companies and has a stake in hundreds of Chinese advanced-manufacturing and chip firms. At least eight of these companies reportedly have ties to the Chinese People’s Liberation Army”, Cotton wrote in his letter, a copy of which he posted on his website.
Cotton also noted Tan’s role as the previous head of Cadence Design Systems, which he said recently “pleaded guilty to illegally selling its products to a Chinese military university and transferring its technology to an associated Chinese semiconductor company without obtaining licenses.”
Tan was head of the company at that time, Cotton said.
The Malaysia-born tech industry veteran took the helm at struggling Intel in March, announcing layoffs as White House tariffs and export restrictions muddied the market.
He has said it “won’t be easy” to overcome challenges faced by the company.
Intel is one of Silicon Valley’s most iconic companies, but its fortunes have been dwarfed by Asian powerhouses TSMC and Samsung, which dominate the made-to-order semiconductor business.
The company was also caught by surprise with the emergence of Nvidia as the world’s preeminent AI chip provider.
Intel’s niche has been in chips used in traditional computing processes, steadily being eclipsed by the AI revolution.
