July 11, 2000

BARCELONA - - The worldwide demand for notebook computers is growing much faster than market researchers had predicted, according to the leading chip maker for this technology INTEL announced at a presention in Barcelona, Spain.

Don MacDonald,, director of mobile platform group marketing at Intel said that he now expects 30 million notebooks to be lproduced in 2000., ounumbering an earlier forecast of 23 million pieces by another analyst firm, IDC.

While miniature sized portables and thin-and-light notebooks enjoy increasing demand, the emphasis at present is on regular size units that can replace a desktop PCs with all its function. But he predicted a change in users's demands, as the Internet in future would require more mobility.

As mobility also increases the risk of data and equipment theft, Intel is also working on a wide range of security technologies with the final aim to render stolen notebooks useless, the executive said.

Intel is gearing R&D towards these demands, expected to almost double the clock speed of its fastest processor for notebook uses to over 1GHz, he said.