Intel officially announced to launch new Core Ultra Series Processors by dropping the'i' from its existing i9, i7, i5 and i3 processors series. The Core and Core Ultra are the new branding for Meteor Lake processors series. With this announcement, Intel redefined its client processor branding, which is the biggest shift for the company. With the growing demand for highly efficient and powerful processors, Intel is launching new processors with more power and better usability on heavy workloads.

With the new launch Intel Core i3 series will be renamed as Intel Core 3, the Intel Core i5 series  will be renamed as Intel Core 5, and the Intel Core i7 series will be renamed as Intel Core 7. So, 'i' will be replaced with the 'Core' brand name. 

Intel is doing a major rebranding of its processors for the first time in the last 15 years. This rebranding is to comply with the upcoming powerful Meteor Lake processors. The Meteor Lake processor is the 14th Generation Intel processor. Intel will also classify the processors into two tiers,  one for mainstream and other for flagship offerings.

Intel will be launching Meteor Lake processors possibly in the second half of 2023 and the letter 'i' will be replaced with the 'Core' word in the branding. So, Intel processors with following brand names will be launched:

a) Core

b) Core Ultra

Core Processors:

a) Intel Core 3

b) Intel Core 5

c) Intel Core 7

d) Intel Core 9

Ultra Series Processors:

a) Intel Core Ultra 5

b) Intel Core Ultra 7

c) Intel Core Ultra 9

Ultra series processors will come with high-performance SKUs and will be used mostly in gaming and high end desktops. Such processors will be used for AI, Machine Learning, Video Processing and Enterprise desktop computers.

There won't be any Ultra series processors in Intel Core 3 models.

As per company release notes, the upcoming Meteor Lake CPUs will be powerful processors which will be manufactured using Intel 4 process nodes. This manufacturing process will use the chiplet design with 3D packaging technology that actually improves the graphics performance and makes it more energy efficient. With this new technology Intel will come up with high performance processors with energy efficiencies. The Meteor Lake chips will be the first chip featuring a dedicated AI Engine, which Intel is calling Intel AI Boost.