Intel says it has chips ready for smartphones

Intel Corp, seeking to foray into the mobile-phone chip market after more than a decade of failed attempts, said new processors going on sale this year give it more competitive capabilities in smartphones and tablets.

The Atom x3, the company's first chip with an integrated modem needed to connect to cellular networks, is being shipped to customers, Intel said, on Monday at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. The company will update the processor to give it access to faster 4G wireless networks in the second half.

The world's largest chipmaker is taking a new run at wooing customers for smartphones, where demand is outpacing that for personal computers. Last year, Intel made progress in tablets, shipping 46 million chips, though that business was supported by subsidy payments to manufacturers that contributed to an operating loss of $4.21 billion in its mobile division.

The new integrated processor and modem, along with a new stand-alone modem chip -- also being shown off in Barcelona, Spain -- are part of a push by Chief Executive Officer Brian Krzanich to offer products that won't need subsidies to generate orders.

Intel said it will be among the first to offer a modem chip, the new XMM 7360, that will let phone users pull data from cellular networks at speeds as fast as 450 megabits per second. Qualcomm Inc.'s lead in the latest LTE, or long term evolution, standard helped that company win more than 80 percent share in chips for 4G phones last year. Intel didn't crack 1 percent of that market, according to data from IDC Corp.

Qualcomm plans to demonstrate its own latest modem at the Barcelona conference, underlining the pace at which phone components are being improved. That chip enables access as fast as 600 megabits per second.

San Diego-based Qualcomm last week announced that it also will show off new wireless capabilities in its chips that mean future phones and networks can operate on additional airwaves typically used by other wireless technologies, such as Wi-Fi and cordless phones. That's an advancement aimed at speeding up data downloads and easing data traffic on frequencies owned by cellular phone service operators.

Intel also gave details at the event of a new chip design that will start appearing in mobile devices next year. The design, code-named Cherry Trail, will be manufactured on more advanced technology, giving it more battery life and better performance, Intel said.

Taiwan's MediaTek Inc., so far the only other company to have supplied a significant amount of chips for 4G handsets, also announced new, more powerful chips for tablets and a modem and processor combination for phones that can connect to LTE networks everywhere in the world.