Intel appoints 10 Israeli executives to senior global positions

Semiconductor giant Intel Corporation has appointed 10 Israeli executives to senior international positions within the multinational, the company said on Wednesday, including a second Israeli woman as global corporate vice president.

Karin Eibschitz-Segal has been leading Intel’s development centers in Israel as well as the Intel Validation Engineering branch in the Design Engineering Group worldwide for the past four years, overseeing the work of about 10,000 people globally. She has been second-in-command to Intel Israel CEO Yaniv Garty since 2017, and will now take on the role of global corporate VC at Intel Corp.

Intel has three major development centers in Israel — in Haifa, Petah Tikva and Jerusalem — tasked with some of the company’s major processor operations, and an advanced chip manufacturing plant in Kiryat Gat, which is expanding. The company is also building a second $200 million campus in Haifa to develop the “chips of the future.”

This summer, Intel appointed Shlomit Weiss as senior vice president at the global company, making her co-general manager of the US tech giant’s design engineering group. Weiss rejoined Intel from Mellanox Technologies (acquired by Nvidia). She’d previously worked at Intel for 28 years, winning the company’s top award, the “Intel Achievement Award,” for developing the firm’s dual-core processor architecture in Israel.

Weiss has registered several patents on microprocessor development.

Intel also recently appointed Reda Masarwa as the first Arab Israeli vice president of Fab Construction Engineering at Intel Corporation. In this capacity, he is responsible for planning the construction and conversion of Intel’s most innovative plants worldwide. Masarwa has been working at Intel for 24 years.

Arab Israelis are severely underrepresented in Israel’s tech sector (as are women and members of the ultra-Orthodox community), accounting for only around two percent of workers despite making up 20% of the national population.

On Wednesday, Intel said it was also appointing Daniel Benatar, co-general manager of Fab Sort Manufacturing, as a corporate VP. Benatar oversees chip manufacturing plants in Israel, Ireland,  and Arizona and Oregon in the US.

In addition, eight other Intel managers were promoted to various senior roles at Intel’s operations and engineering departments.

“The nominations are a source of pride for Israel,” said Intel Israel’s senior management in a statement.

“Intel Corporation continues to promote the executives of Intel Israel to lead global strategic operations and engineering from Israel. The significant promotion of ten Israelis to these organizational levels testifies to the great confidence and appreciation that Intel Corporation has for the human capital in Intel Israel,” the management added.

Intel is the largest private employer in Israel with over 14,000 workers: 7,000 development workers in all of Intel’s development centers, 4,900 production workers, and 2,100 employees in Mobileye, Moovit and Habana Labs, Israeli companies Intel acquired in recent years.

These appointments come as the world is witnessing a global shortage of semiconductors, which is triggering price rises and a lack of supply of products including TVs, cellphones and other electronic devices. The problem developed as factories shut down when the coronavirus pandemic hit, but shortages remain as COVID-19 has caused a surge in demand for all things digital.

In July, The Times of Israel reported how tech giants in the semiconductor space are going all-in on Israel, where they are betting on top local talent to drive their efforts forward.

Intel, alongside multinational giants like Google, Microsoft, Facebook, and Nvidia, have all been setting up or expanding their chip design operations in Israel – cementing the country’s position as a silicon workhorse.