New York, February 3, 2026, 10:56 AM EST — Regular session
- Intel shares rose about 2.6% in late morning trading, briefly hitting a 52-week high.
- SoftBank Corp.’s SAIMEMORY Corp. signed a deal with Intel on next-generation “Z-Angle Memory” aimed at AI workloads.
- A Form 144 notice showed an Intel insider planned a small share sale, while traders looked ahead to chip-sector earnings later Tuesday.
Intel (INTC) shares rose about 2.6% on Tuesday, lifting the stock above $50 as investors digested a SoftBank-linked collaboration on next-generation memory technology geared toward artificial intelligence. The stock was up at $50.07 in late morning trade after briefly touching $51.46, its highest level in 52 weeks.
The move matters because Intel’s tape has been headline-driven — less about near-term PC demand, more about whether the company can claw back relevance in data centers and AI infrastructure. Memory and power limits are an increasing pinch point for big AI systems, and new approaches, even early ones, can pull money back into the name.
This is not a near-term revenue story. But it is a reminder that the AI buildout is not just about graphics chips and CPUs; memory bandwidth and energy use can be the speed limit, and investors have been paying up for anything that looks like capacity relief.
SoftBank Corp said its wholly owned subsidiary SAIMEMORY signed a collaborative agreement with Intel on February 2 to advance commercialization of “Z-Angle Memory” (ZAM), which it described as high-capacity, high-bandwidth and low-power. SoftBank said the partners are aiming for prototypes in the fiscal year ending March 31, 2028 and commercialization in fiscal 2029. (ソフトバンク)
In plain terms: the project is about DRAM — the main working memory in computers and servers — but stacked and packaged differently to push more data through with less power. That matters in data centers, where training and running large AI models can choke on memory throughput.
“Standard memory architectures aren’t meeting AI needs,” said Dr. Joshua Fryman, an Intel fellow and CTO of Intel Government Technologies, in comments carried by Converge Digest. (Converge Digest)
Intel also had product news of its own this week. On Monday it announced Intel Xeon 600 processors for workstations and said the chips would be available through OEM and system integrator partners beginning late March 2026. (Newsroom)
Separately, a Form 144 notice showed an Intel insider planned to sell up to 20,000 shares, with an aggregate market value of about $980,822, according to a filing summary that linked to SEC EDGAR. A Form 144 is a notice of proposed sale under SEC Rule 144, and it does not guarantee a sale will occur. (Stock Titan)
But the risks are still the same ones that have dogged the turnaround: execution and supply. Intel told investors in late January it was struggling to meet demand for server chips used in AI data centers and forecast first-quarter sales and profit below estimates; “Intel’s turnaround story remains supply-constrained rather than demand-constrained,” said Michael Schulman of Running Point Capital. (Reuters)
Macro is also in the background. Bureau of Labor Statistics said the January U.S. employment report will be delayed due to a partial government shutdown and will be rescheduled once government funding resumes. (Reuters)
Next up, traders will look for sector read-through from Advanced Micro Devices, which is due to report results after the closing bell on Tuesday. In a market trading fast on AI spend and data-center demand, that kind of print can move the whole complex — Intel included. (Investopedia)
