We’ve recently heard that Nvidia and AMD may soon be ready to launch their own ARM-based client processors. That, combined with predictions that ARM chips might account for up to 30% of the PC market in just a few years, sounds like worrying information for rivals. However, Intel appears to be anything but worried as it rides the high of its surprisingly good earnings. Is the threat of ARM chips really as insignificant as Intel’s CEO makes it out to be?

Right now, Intel dominates the client CPU market by a large margin, although AMD also makes some of the best processors and is a formidable competitor in its own right. Either way, both companies base their chips on the x86 system architecture. However, Microsoft has taken great interest in the ARM architecture over the years, and both AMD and Nvidia will soon be able to jump in. Until 2024, Qualcomm has an exclusive deal for making ARM-based chips for Windows devices, but when that deal is up, there’s nothing left to stop other manufacturers from making their own chips. With the path cleared and Qualcomm leading the charge, the transition to ARM for Windows machines seems more possible than ever.