Intel to Donate More Than 1 Million Personal Protective Equipment to Help Healthcare Workers Worldwide The CPU maker announced the initiative yesterday, donating masks, gloves, and other protective gear to healthcare workers. What is Intel doing with such equipment in the first place? It benefits from being one of the world's largest silicon manufacturers, with factories and clean rooms all over the world.

Workers in Intel's factories must wear protective gear whenever they are replacing, testing, or repairing equipment on the manufacturing floor. Many of you have already seen pictures of Intel's bunny suits, but except in those cases, the bunny suits protect the equipment from human contact, not the people themselves. [Intel's Todd Brady said, "We will be donating masks, gloves, face shields, and other items sourced from our factory inventory and emergency supplies.

In short, whatever one thinks about Intel and its recent 10nm manufacturing problems, and the fact that AMD is on the rise, partly due to its decision to go completely fabless, one can appreciate Intel's decision to keep the faith in its own factories worldwide.

Intel now has 16 factories around the world: four in Oregon, four in Arizona, one in New Mexico, two in Kiryat Ghat, three in Lakeslip, Ireland, one in China, and with the recent closing of its Costa Rican packaging plant. I was able to visit Fab 28 in Kiryat Gat last summer. For a hardware geek like me, this place where Intel tricks sand into thinking was an incredible sight. [The company has already donated $1 million to the International Red Cross and is working with health authorities around the world, along with local governments, to ensure that aid gets to where it is needed most.

"We are truly grateful to the health care workers who are on the front lines of containing this pandemic," says Brady.