Intel did not include coverage of its lesser known "Wildcat Lake" mobile processor family during a main stage presentation of new-gen Core Ultra Series products. Despite talk of various "Ultra Low Power" solutions, the main focus on day one was "Panther Lake." Following the conclusion of Team Blue's big conference, a few news outlets noticed an interesting Core Series 3 "Die Package Configuration" slide; seemingly not deemed worthy of being placed alongside nearby larger "Panther Lake" chip designs (consisting of three configs). According to the loose slide, Intel's smaller "Wildcat Lake" package makes do with six processor cores (2P+4LPE) and two Xe3 iGPU cores. This information matches leaks from last year; with a next-gen chip design destined for eventual deployment in entry-level notebooks.

Surprisingly, a physical sample was handed over to HardwareLuxx.de on the Las Vegas showroom floor. Photos show a tile layout that does not completely align with the chipmaker's official product render. According to Andreas Schilling's news article, Intel representatives have confirmed the existence of their "Wildcat Lake" family—going under "Core Series 3" guises. The Blue Team anticipates a second quarter launch, with "Wildcat Lake" heading to edge systems and embedded platforms. In a separate report, Abhishek Yadav claims that the upcoming "Core Series 3" processor series will replace "older Alder Lake-N lineup." Going into further detail, HardwareLuxx was informed about specific "Core Ultra 5 332" and "Core Ultra 5 322" SKUs being designated as the smallest of "Panther Lake" packages (4P+4LPE & 4 Xe3 cores). Very late last year, rumors of refreshed "Wildcat Lake" products turned up on the internet—finalized examples are likely some distance from release.

After much anticipation, Intel has finally unveiled its "Panther Lake" Core Ultra Series 3 mobile processors, built on the 18A node. This new mobile platform aims to maximize performance across various areas, with a significant focus on integrated Arc graphics. The "Panther Lake" features a new Arc B390 GPU with 12 Xe cores, delivering up to 77% more performance compared to the previous generation "Lunar Lake" Arc 140V iGPU. Intel's performance claims are supported by comparisons to non-Intel graphics, such as the AMD Radeon 890M. In these comparisons, Intel's solution outperforms AMD's "Strix Point" iGPU by about 73% with upscaling technologies and is 82% faster at native resolution. For handheld devices relying on iGPU performance, Intel's "Panther Lake" appears to be the leader in gaming, at least for the time being.

Interestingly, Intel is also developing a separate handheld-focused "Panther Lake" SoC, likely featuring a new Arc B SKU, rumored to be named Arc B380. This version is expected to be more power-efficient, possibly through special binning of the dies, maintaining the full 12 Xe cores configuration at slightly reduced clock speeds to achieve similar performance with a much lower TDP. According to Intel, many handheld manufacturers, including Acer, MSI, and GDP, are showing interest in this SoC for their designs. However, we can also expect some full laptop SoCs to be used in handheld devices as well. Intel also claims that the new Arc B390 is comparable to NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 4050 laptop, which is a discrete chip.

Today at CES, Intel unveiled Intel Core Ultra Series 3 processors, the first AI PC platform built on Intel 18A process technology that was designed and manufactured in the United States. Powering over 200 designs from leading, global partners, Series 3 will be the most broadly adopted and globally available AI PC platform Intel has ever delivered.

Within the Intel Core Ultra Series 3 mobile lineup, a new class of Intel Core Ultra X9 and X7 processors come packed with the highest performing, integrated Intel Arc graphics. They are purpose-built for multitaskers that handle advanced workloads like gaming, creation and productivity on the go. The top SKUs feature up to 16 CPU cores, 12 Xe -cores and 50 NPU TOPS, delivering up to 60% better multithread performance over 77% faster gaming performance and up to 27 hours of battery life.