Intel, the largest producer of microchips in the United States, has announced the discontinuation of its bitcoin mining chip series a year after it was introduced.

The company said that it will stop taking orders for its Blockscale chips by 20 October, and that it will end shipping by 20 April, 2024.

Intel said that it will continue to monitor opportunities in the cryptocurrency market. The company is refocusing its efforts on its new IDM 2.0 strategy of outsourcing some chipmaking to outside customers while ramping up production of smaller and faster chips.

A spokesperson for the chipmaker said: "As we prioritise our investments in IDM 2.0, we have end-of-lifed the Intel Blockscale 1000 Series ASIC while we continue to support our Blockscale customers."

Intel becomes the latest major component manufacturer to actively distance itself from crypto mining. Last month, the chief technology officer at graphics card maker Nvidia came out strongly against cryptocurrencies, telling The Guardian that they do not "bring anything useful for society."

Despite its popularity amongst miners, Nvidia never fully embraced the practice and in 2021 released software which artificially constrained the ability for users to mine Ethereum to ensure stocks remained for gamers and AI researchers.

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