17 billion $ is a joke the Intel share buyback program is 20 billion $.... instead of buying their own share they can do that without raising or borrowing a single cent.

But ... this article is a sign that investors are losing patience and so they might not have a free hand. It might seem straightforward to cancel buybacks but if you lose your investors then you might find its someone else implementing a new strategy.

But is it more of a gamble than not doing it?

I always had trouble finding wafer starts per months for Intel and TSMC both, if anyone have such data please share -- nonetheless, it seems like the demand for TSMC far outstrips supply and so there is plenty of room for Intel yet. In the worst case... there's a lot of money to be made as #2 chipmaker even if it's less than they are making as #1 chipmaker?

good luck, there is a reason you can't find it.

I am not sure I have seen evidence for what you say. That is a complicated assertion because it speaks to wafer's started, wafer's finished, yield, die size, and technology among other things.

Honestly, I suspect that Intel's struggles (as per typical) with new technologies are around ossification of technical paths, struggles with yield, and copy-stupid. That leaves them struggling to produce the quantity that customers need, and has opened avenues for customers to find other routes that provide them with more control. They are also seeing the benefits of custom silicon and the possibilities of full stack optimization, as opposed to optimization of just one or two parts which largely drove older approaches to software/hardware/battery efficiency.

My other comment is that SPENDING on R&D is not always the best metric...