Moore's Law and Corporate Foresight at INTEL

John Miranda has a hobby that sounds suspiciously like his day job. He points a telescope into the night sky, collects data and uses software to separate useful signals from noise. Astrophotography is also, he jokes, a good way to spend money and lose sleep. Inside a large company, the signals are different, but the challenge is familiar: which observations deserve attention, and what should anyone do about them?

In this episode of Innovation Rockstars, Intel’s Director of Strategy in the Office of the Data Center and AI Group explores that question with Dr. Christian Mühlroth. The conversation covers computing, sustainability and corporate foresight. Its most useful lessons concern the people between an emerging trend and an investment decision. Miranda describes a contributor network, the everyday work of earning trust and a product sustainability discussion that eventually reached Intel’s global executive staff.

See the noise from the executive’s chair

It is tempting to explain corporate inertia as a failure of imagination. Miranda offers a more sympathetic account. Executives hear pitches every day from people convinced that their particular development demands action. Meanwhile, customers, investors and operating teams need attention. The business paying everyone’s salary continues to exert a powerful pull.

“It becomes progressively challenging to differentiate a genuine signal from noise”

For a foresight practitioner, this changes the assignment. Discovering an interesting development is only the beginning. The next task is to make a credible case for its importance, understand the decision it might affect and reach the people who can act on it. Another urgent presentation can simply add to the noise.

Miranda’s point matters for R&D teams competing for resources. Their technical insight may be valuable, but decision-makers still need help understanding why it deserves attention alongside everything else on their desks.

Build a network that gives something back

Intel’s foresight approach, as Miranda describes it, starts with a community of contributors. Participants bring technical knowledge alongside perspectives on policy, legal questions, ethics and society. They compare observations, review findings more formally and develop cases for what appears significant.

Research then tests those cases. Miranda mentions ITONICS among the tools used to examine hypotheses, drawing on primary and secondary research. An initial hunch invites further questions: if this is true, what else should be observable? What additional evidence would strengthen the argument?

Keeping the community alive takes less glamorous work. Miranda looks for intellectually curious colleagues, connects people with shared interests and passes useful resources around. An available seat at an external event can become an invitation for someone elsewhere in the company.

These small exchanges make participation worthwhile. If the central team only collects insights and disappears, contributors have little reason to keep helping. A useful connection or a relevant introduction gives them a reason to return.

Earn access before you need a decision

Implementation brings a different set of questions. Who actually decides? Do they know the foresight team? Is there an established relationship, or is this another unfamiliar name requesting time?

Miranda encourages practitioners to understand the advisers and colleagues around a decision-maker. Those relationships can help an insight reach the right conversation. They also need attention between major requests. Someone who consistently brings useful information is easier to trust than someone who appears only when seeking approval.

His warning about trust is concrete. Handle sensitive information carefully. Deliver what you promised. Even a small task left undone after repeated reminders can undermine confidence in your ability to handle something larger.

That gives foresight leaders an operational responsibility alongside their analytical one. Reliability in everyday interactions helps determine whether people will listen when the subject becomes consequential.

Make the future tangible enough to question

Miranda recalls a virtual reality demonstration at the Institute for the Future. Physically in Palo Alto, he found himself exploring a simulated alleyway in China. Another participant joined from Nairobi and offered to show him around.

The experience prompted questions about presence, collaboration and travel. What would it mean to share breakfast with relatives in Europe without boarding a plane? When would a digital encounter be sufficient, and when would being physically together still matter?

The anecdote captures a useful way to approach emerging technology. Miranda starts with an experience and explores its implications. He leaves open questions about the role Intel might play. For product teams, that is a productive position: investigate the changes in behaviour and requirements before assuming that a fashionable technology label already defines a market.

Give a new issue a route into product strategy

Asked for his Innovation Rockstar moment, Miranda chooses sustainability. Intel had long addressed the subject through manufacturing and environmental responsibilities. He wanted to develop the conversation from a product portfolio perspective.

The company had an established process for bringing topics to executive attention. Miranda worked through it and secured a presentation to the global executive staff. He describes stronger engagement with the subject afterwards, with many more colleagues discussing its product implications.

“It makes me wonder why we didn't start this sooner.”

He presents that engagement as a breakthrough in the conversation, rather than offering a quantified commercial result. The distinction is useful. Getting an issue onto the strategic agenda creates an opportunity for decisions; it does not prove that every subsequent initiative will succeed.

For teams building a foresight practice, Miranda’s example offers a demanding test: can an observation survive scrutiny, find a relevant business question and reach a decision-maker through relationships that already carry trust? The telescope may help him find distant objects. Inside Intel, progress also depends on the patient work of connecting people.