This happens to every giant eventually (and to countries or civilizations). They get climb to the top, and then they hold such dominant positions that they aren't forced to try. They get lazy or sloppy (and in Intel's case, I'm not suggesting the engineers were the sloppy ones... more likely strategic decisions from management and quarterly earnings per share-focused execs). Eventually they are dethroned, and some never return to power.

Intel will never go away, but they definitely will become laggards for the foreseeable future. In their industry it takes years or even a decade to see the fruits of your effort.