Intel CEO Touts Collaboration, Mobile Translation Device at Web 2.0 Show

SAN FRANCISCO-- Intel CEO Paul Otellini demonstrated social networking tools his programmers are working on to help the chipmaker's 86,000 employees in 120 companies around the world connect.

Otellini, showing his wares at Web 2.0 Summit here Nov. 6 before joining event co-host John Battelle on the couch for a conversation, also offered an intriguing demo of a handheld device loaded with translation software.

Otellini said social networking tools can be applied in enterprise but haven't been to date. IBM, Microsoft, Cisco and others in a long tail of collaboration software providers would beg to differ.

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"That's an opportunity for you, but it's a need for me running a large company on a global basis," Otellini said, noting that with 86,000 employees scattered around 120 companies around the world, social networking tools are important.

He then demonstrated the enterprise collaboration tools, using the scenario of a new hire named Lily, who works in marketing for Intel in China. He showed tools that let her network with her new colleagues and participate in e-learning work. Lily leverages e-mail, instant messaging, team workspaces, voice and video from one portal.

Otellini stressed that these tools don't yet exist either at Intel or anywhere else. He may or may not have seen the work Pfizer, IBM or Sun Microsystems have done in connecting their thousands of employees via professional networks that embody all the best social software elements of Facebook and LinkedIn, as well as communications tools.

Indeed, eWEEK has seen dozens of similar products and experimental features, and the demonstration mirrored technologies we've already seen from IBM, Sun, Cisco and even businesses that aren't technology based, such as Pfizer.