Google's Making Its Own Chips Now. Time for Intel to Freak Out

Google has built its own computer chip. And this won't be the last. The Internet's most powerful company sent a few shock waves through the tech world yesterday when it revealed that a new custom-designed chip helps run what is surely the future of its vast online empire: artificial intelligence. In building its own chip, Google has taken yet another step along a path that has already remade the tech industry in enormous ways. Over the past decade, the company has designed all sorts of new hardware for the massive data centers that underpin its myriad online services, including computer servers, networking gear, and more. As it created services of unprecedented scope and size, it needed a more efficient breed of hardware to run these services.