The chairman of chip giant Intel, Craig Barrett (pictured), said last night that the company has returned nearly US$12bn to shareholders since 1992.
Microprocessor manufacturer Intel, which employs almost 5,000 people in Ireland, has increased its quarterly dividend on the company’s common stock by 10pc to 14 cent per share.
“The strength of Intel’s competitive position combined with our solid financials allow us to again reward Intel shareholders with an increase in the quarterly dividend,” said Barrett.
“Intel’s dividend yield remains one of the highest in the technology industry and has returned nearly US$12 billion to shareholders since 1992.”
At the end of the fourth quarter, Intel had US$12.8bn in cash and short-term investments, up almost 19pc from US$10.8bn a year earlier.
Intel generated over US$12 billion in cash from operations during 2007 and paid out US$2.6 billion in dividends during the year. The company also spent US$2.7m repurchasing 111m in common stock.
In related news, Intel and Microsoft revealed they will be jointly investing US$20m to create Parallel Computing Research Centres at University of California, Berkeley and University of Illinois.
Research will focus on advancing parallel programming applications, architecture and operating systems software.
Parallel computing brings together advanced software and processors that have multiple cores or engines, which when combined can handle multiple instructions and tasks simultaneously.
Although Microsoft, Intel and many others deliver hardware and software that is capable of handling dual- and quad-core-based PCs today, in the coming years computers are likely to have even more processors inside them.
“Intel has already shown an 80-core research processor, and we’re quickly moving the computing industry to a many-core world,” said Andrew Chien, vice-president, corporate technology group and director, Intel Research.
“Working with Microsoft and these two prestigious universities will help catalyse the long-term breakthroughs that are needed to enable dramatic new applications for the mainstream user.
“We think these new applications will have the ability to efficiently and robustly sense and act in our everyday world with new capabilities: rich digital media and visual interfaces, powerful statistical analyses and search and mobile applications. Ultimately, these sensing and human interface capabilities will bridge the physical world with the virtual,” Chien added.
By John Kennedy
