Intel's concluded its Q4 and full-year 2025 earnings call, revealing interesting things about its foundry operations and node selection. When talking about the upcoming 14A node, Intel confirmed that the node is on track for 2027, with yields that are in good shape. However, the bulk of the 14A external capacity Intel will dedicate depends on customers willing to sign manufacturing contracts first, before Intel spends insane amount of funds required to expand manufacturing capacity. Intel CEO Lib-Bu Tan noted "Engagements with potential external customers on Intel 14A are active. We believe customers will begin to make firm supplier decisions starting in the second half of this year and extending into the first half of 2027. We also have the opportunity to provide strong differentiation in advanced packaging, particularly with EMIB and EMIB-T."

Intel CFO David Zinsner has stated "On 14A, Lip-Bu has been very direct with us on all of this. He does not want to spend on capacity on 14A, only spend on the kind of TD spend or R&D spend associated with 14A, even in the fab until we have customers secured. We've talked about the likelihood is our customers on 14A, their window to secure, or for us to secure them will be in the back half of this year and in the first half of next year. And so once visibility improves there, we'll start to unlock the spend on 14A. I can just add a little bit more. I think on the yield improvement, we see 7%, 8% yield improvement per month." Intel has previously mentioned that while there will be a base capacity for internal use, any future expansion for third-party services will depend on customers' willingness to invest capital with Intel Foundry.