Intel is committed to a more energy efficient future with its Project Athena initiative. The company is following up on a project announced at CES 2019, where Intel will offer guidance to PC equipment and component makers to create future laptops. This week the plans were unveiled as Intel has brought together hundreds of members of the PC manufacturing industry in Taiwan. That's where there is one of the Intel Athena Open Labs projects, specifically in Taipei, and another one in Folsom, California.
How the Athena project will work
Intel's Athena Open Labs project will serve as a resource for equipment and component manufacturers to test their products. Intel has brought these engineers from Open Labs with experience in systems on a chip (SoC) and power optimization. They will test and guide manufacturers on how to improve their products. The goal is to ensure a wide range of Athena-compatible components that OEMs can count on to work with more energy-efficient laptops. Component manufacturers will submit their products to the Athena Open Labs project to see if they can meet the specifications. These components can include everything from displays to audio devices, haptic feedback engines, SSDs, wireless modules, and more. By covering the entire range of components, the program should allow OEMs to choose components for devices that meet Athena's specifications and more or less ensure better energy efficiency. The Athena project is heading to 2020 and beyond, with future devices with 5G and AI connectivity. But we won't wait until 2020 for the first Athena-spec laptops. The first batch of the Athena aircraft project is scheduled for the second half of this year. And, while the Athena project focuses on components, not complete computers, the news did not specify which chips would be at the heart of the experiment. Intel's Ice Lake processors could arrive by the end of the year, and with their 10nm architecture, they could be the prime candidate for more power-hungry laptops.