It's an end of an era: Intel has confirmed through their latest K-10 filing that its infamous 'tick-tock' process development cycle is dead.
Instead of having two processor families on each die shrink, Intel will be using three or more over the coming years. The K-10 filing states that Intel will "expect to lengthen the amount of time we will utilize our 14 [nanometer] and our next-generation 10 [nanometer] process technologies".
Intel will continue to release new products each year, but there will be a tighter control over architecture optimization, as the development of process technology slows. So... what does this mean? It confirms that Intel's next-gen 'Kaby Lake' platform will be made on 14nm. It also confirms that the release window for 10nm from Intel will be 2017 at the earliest, and 7nm - well, that's 2019-2020 or beyond now.
