Intel is teasing the press that "something big will be announced" on September 2. The teaser email does not mention specifics, but my guess is that the event is related to Tiger Lake (the code name for the unreleased 11th generation Core mobile CPU).

Tiger Lake itself is no secret; Intel showed a first look and demo of its next-generation mobile CPUs at CES in January. Chip architecture has also been mentioned from time to time. For example, Intel recently announced the Thunderbolt 4 specification and stated that Tiger Lake will be the first product to integrate this standard.

Leaks and rumors surrounding Tiger Lake have been rampant over the past few months. Officially, however, Intel claims that its next-generation chip will deliver double-digit performance gains, a "massive" jump in AI performance and "a big leap in graphics."

The latter claim is tied to Intel's Xe graphics architecture, which makes its long-awaited debut in Tiger Lake. What makes this announcement particularly interesting is that Xe is the same basic architecture that drives Intel's first modern discrete GPU (since the Larrabee debacle).

Little else could be more central to this event. Intel said in January that it planned to announce Tiger Lake this year, and just a few weeks ago CEO Bob Swan confirmed that Tiger Lake is expected to be announced this summer.

"We will unveil Tiger Lake later this summer to solidify our position as the undisputed leader in mobile computing and PC innovation," CEO Swan said.

The original plan was to unveil Tiger Lake at Computex, but the event was canceled. Therefore, Intel is likely to hold its own virtual event in early September.