With Intel promising to start volume production of its ‘lead’ Intel 18A product—likely ‘Panther Lake’—in the second half of 2025, the semiconductor giant is close to achieving one of the most important milestones in the comeback plan first set out by former Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger.

Interim Intel co-CEO Michelle Johnston Holthaus said the company’s “lead” Intel 18A product is set to enter volume production in the second half of the year as the company samples the chip with customers.

Holthaus (pictured) made the statement in a disclosure by Intel ahead of its CES 2025 keynote Monday in Las Vegas, where the semiconductor giant revealed multiple Intel Core Ultra 200 series products for commercial and consumer PCs, among other new products.

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“And Intel is only going to continue bolstering its AI PC product portfolio in 2025 and beyond as we sample our lead Intel 18A product to customers now ahead of volume production in the second half of 2025,” said Holthaus, who is also CEO of Intel Products.

While Holthaus didn’t specify which Intel product is using Intel 18A in the statement, company officials have previously discussed Panther Lake, the next generation of Intel’s Core Ultra processor family, as the lead product for the chip manufacturing node. It also plans to offer Intel 18A to external customers, such as Microsoft Azure and Amazon Web Services, as part of its contract chip manufacturing business, Intel Foundry.

At an investor event in December, Holthaus said Intel had provided engineering samples of Panther Lake to eight customers that have powered it on. She said this move signaled “that the health of the silicon is good and the health of [Intel Foundry] is good.”

Intel 18A is the fifth and last advanced chip manufacturing process that is a key part of the comeback plan first set out by former Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger. As he revealed in 2021, the chipmaker sought to accelerate the development of leading-edge nodes after falling behind due to manufacturing missteps for several years.

While the original plan called for Intel to introduce five nodes in four years, the company has commercialized the first three—Intel 7, Intel 4 and Intel 3—and decided this year to halt commercialization of the fourth, Intel 20A, to focus on Intel 18A.

Intel has repeatedly said over the past few years that Intel 18A would return the company to “process leadership” against its Asian foundry rivals, TSMC and Samsung Electronics.

“I think 18A itself, obviously, is our first big step in getting back to process leadership and bringing our foundries back to the historical strengths that we’ve had,” Holthaus said last month.