Intel scraps Developer Forum as world progresses beyond PC

After almost 20 years as a staple on the tech calendar, Intel has announced it has canned its annual Developer Forum event.

Killing off the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) with immediate effect, the chipset giant has confirmed it’s pulling the plug on its heavily attended yearly gathering in order to focus on other opportunities.

The move comes as the company has seen a shift in its core business, moving away from a solely PC-centric foundation to new emerging technologies and data-centric ventures.

“Intel has evolved its event portfolio and decided to retire the IDF program moving forward,” the company announced on its website. 

It added: “Thank you for nearly 20 great years with the Intel Developer Forum.”

Despite killing off its annual developer conference, the company has been keen to stress that it’s still keen to work closely with devs on new ideas and technologies.

Instead of IDF, however, the firm has confirmed that it will focus on an “evolved” event mix that will see a series of smaller, more specialised events take priority. These will allow developers to focus on specialist areas and interests rather than a one-for-all style event.

No longer fills the need

According to an Intel spokesperson speaking with Anandtech (via Engadget), “Intel felt that IDF no longer fills the need when it comes to giving out information.”

The report added: “As a result, the decision has been made to find new ways to communicate with the audience (media, developers and companies) and the ecosystem with targeted events.”

What this ultimately means for us, the consumers, however, is the potential for more free flowing product development.

Without an annual event needing big news announcements on a specific date in the calendar, Intel will be free to rollout updates and announcements on a more fluid timescale.

This could pose problems for developers, however, with those looking to master development for new platforms potentially having to attend multiple events rather than one to harness the skills required.

This year’s IDF, which was tipped to take place in August, will no longer happen.
There are still major developer conferences to get excited about though, even as consumers. 

Next month’s Google I/O gathering is expected to Android O formally unveiled, while Apple’s WWDC event in June will likely act as the launch platform for the iPhone 8-bound iOS 11 software.

• Intel's next-gen CPUs are just around the corner

April 18, 2017 at 05:45PM
Luke Johnson