America’s technological supremacy isn’t being lost to competition—it’s being surrendered by the very boards entrusted to protect it. No case exposes this more than Intel, once Silicon Valley’s pride, now the poster child for why U.S. corporate governance must be rewritten for an era of technoeconomic warfare. And I should know, because I personally played a pivotal role in bringing to light the crisis that led to the unprecedented nationalization of 9.9% stake in America’s chips champion. The U.S. government acquiring such a stake, effectively converting lending to equity, comes in the hopes of both resurrecting a failed champion as well as earning a return on investment as a government benefactor.
It wasn’t my plan to find myself embroiled in international intrigue involving semiconductors. Armed with a law degree and an MBA, I began my career as a Wall Street analyst at the turn of the century, and I worked on several sides of the fence over the next few years. I dipped my toe in the white-shoe law firm world and spent time at a hedge fund—I was even interim general counsel for the Dallas Stars NHL team for several months.
