Intel has hired a senior executive from rival company Qualcomm to aid the company's initiatives in mobile and Internet devices.
Amir Faintuch is the former president of Qualcomm Atheros, which is the networking and connectivity division of Qualcomm. He is now the senior vice president and co-general manager of Intel's Platform Engineering Group.
Intel rarely hires top executives from rival companies, as Intel is known to have a culture that is insular. The hiring of Faintuch, however, shows the eagerness that Intel has on the improvement of its struggling mobile and Internet device business, where Qualcomm is the leader.
Faintuch will join Josh Walden in leading the Platform Engineering Group.
Chuck Mulloy, a spokesman for Intel, said that Faintuch brings strong network skills and system on chips designing experience to the company.
System on chips or SoCs, which combines features such as Wi-Fi, modems and memory, is not of Intel's expertise, as the company is known for creating laptop and desktop computer processors. SoCs are usually found in tablets and smartphones.
"We want to accelerate our success rate with SoCs and get the designs aligned and the roadmaps aligned to do that," said Mulloy. "We've made good progress but there's more to be done. Amir has extensive management experience and a strong resume."
Intel announced the hiring of Faintuch in an email to its employees.
A spokesman for Qualcomm issued no comments for the departure of Faintuch to a rival company.
Since the appointment of Brian Krzanich to Intel's CEO position in 2013, he has initiated several significant changes that look to boost the slumping PC sales of the company.
The decreasing sales for PC and slow growth in mobile devices for Intel, paired with Qualcomm's development as the leading manufacturer for smartphone chips, has made engineers look at Qualcomm as the better company to work for.
Among the changes that Krzanich has made has been to allow the use of the company's chip manufacturing factories to other companies that are willing to pay to use them.
A similar switch of executives between the two rival companies has happened in the past, but in the opposite direction. Anand Chandrasekher, an Intel senior executive that has been in the company for 25 years, transferred to Qualcomm in 2012 to become the company's chief marketing officer.
Intel has recently revealed its Broadwell technology that allows the company to manufacture 14nm chips. The first product that uses the technology, the Core M chip, will be unveiled at the IFA expo in Berlin in September.
