As organizations look to scale AI agents while balancing security and performance, Intel has chosen a hybrid execution model that combines local and cloud processing on its AI PCs. The hybrid model will be the most effective path for adopting agents, whilst limiting cybersecurity concerns.

With the hybrid execution model, privacy is enhanced. By moving away from the cloud only model, Intel allows OpenClaw to process sensitive information such as private documents, financial statements and transcriptions locally on the device. Only non-sensitive, public facing information are sent to the cloud, ensuring users maintain full control over their critical information.

Running a hybrid model brings about significant cost reductions. Running the reasoning and context processing stages of an AI task significantly reduces the number of tokens sent to the cloud. This allows developers to scale the use of agents on their systems while keeping operational expenses low.

The hybrid model also allows for a more power efficient operation and performance. Utilizing the new Intel Core Ultra Series 3 (Panther Lake) processors, OpenClaw can handle large models exceeding 30 billion parameters with low power consumption. This architecture allows “always on” AI functionality that can manage memory and planning in the background, without draining battery life and or overheating devices.

The future of AI is local first.