Intel downplays Viiv and vPro brands
Published: 23 Jul 2007 10:06 BST
…prevent it from wandering in different directions, and Otellini actually reorganised the entire company around that premise.
So, as Intel was designing Viiv, Kim planned similar marketing campaigns around those two names with the same requirements as Centrino. The message was supposed to be that Viiv is the ultimate digital home PC, or vPro is the ultimate business PC.
In Viiv's case, Intel wanted PC shoppers to associate that brand with the perfect multimedia PC, with plenty of performance for media decoding, networking chips that streamed movies around the home, and smart software that makes all this as easy as setting the clock on the VCR. Later, Intel would unveil services branded to work with Viiv PCs and big-screen TVs, such as a fantasy-football application from Yahoo.
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The problem is that people haven't shown wide interest in using PCs this way. And those who have are generally savvy enough to know what kind of performance and software they need without having to match little coloured stickers on PCs to software applications and services.
The Viiv name is odd, of course. But the success of Nintendo's Wii has shown everyone that it's very possible to attach a weird name to a great product or experience.
PC buyers just don't understand what makes a Viiv PC a Viiv PC, Baker said. Whereas Centrino stuck in buyers' minds as wireless networking, Viiv never offered PC users anything they really wanted or that they couldn't get elsewhere.
People understand Core as a brand because it represents Intel's best available processor, Baker said.
"Every once in a while Intel starts to think they can separate themselves from the hardware," Baker said. "These things remind them that, at their core, they are a processor company."
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