Intel will lower its Sandy Bridge-based notebook processor’s prices.

Intel is planning to lower prices with 10 – 15% of some of its Core i3 and i5 notebook processors and has already informed its partners. Intel’s move to price reduction is to encourage vendors to drop prices due to the company’s upcoming Ivy Bridge processors, which are expected to be announced in April, next year.

The 22nm Ivy Bridge processors (including Core i5-3450 and Core i7-3370) are expected to be priced between $184 – $332 USD, around $10 – $15 USD more expensive than some of Intel’s existing processors.

Lenovo, Asus and Acer have already dropped prices of Core i5-2430 Sandy Bridge based notebooks to under $20,000 TWD ($659 USD) and Core i3 models below $13,000 TWD ($430 USD), and are expected to drop prices of their first-generation Core i5-based Ultrabooks to $799 – $899 USD, in January of 2012.

That will make possible the remaining Sandy Bridge notebook inventory to clear-up and will avoid issues during the transition to the newer Ivy Bridge platform.

Via DigiTimes