Intel And InspireSemi Announce New Powerful Microchips

The digital world is powered by high-performance semiconductors or microprocessors and as technology advances, so does the need to design and develop more capable microprocessors.

This becomes even more vital as the digital realm is quickly adopting technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and generative artificial intelligence (GenAI), which require high compute and high processing capabilities.

As a result, semiconductor design and development companies are on the lookout to create and produce unique, cutting-edge chips.

This is what chip designers and makers Intel and InspireSemi are looking to do with their latest announcements.

So, what did the two companies announce? Let’s explore!
 

What Is Intel’s Chiplet New About?

 

• Through a news release published on its website, Intel announced it had achieved a revolutionary milestone that enabled high-speed data transmission and data processing using integrated photonics technology.

• Originally announced and demonstrated at the Optical Fiber Communication Conference (OFC) 2024, Intel’s new first-ever fully integrated optical compute interconnect (OCI) chiplet is the most advanced one in the industry.

• The chiplet, which offers high-bandwidth interconnect, can enhance AI data center infrastructure and high-performance computing (HPC) applications and environments.

• It's designed to support 64 channels of 32 gigabits per second (Gbps) data transmission in each direction up to 100 meters, which could vary based on practical applications.

• As per the company, its first implementation supports up to 4 terabits per second (Tbps) bidirectional data transfer.

• Additionally, it will help facilitate future scalability of central processing units (CPU) / graphics processing units (GPU) cluster connectivity and enabling higher bandwidth, lower power consumption and longer reach in AI infrastructure.

• The release explains, “As an analogy, replacing electrical I/O with optical I/O in CPUs and GPUs to transfer data is like going from using horse-drawn carriages to distribute goods, limited in capacity and range, to using cars and trucks that can deliver much larger quantities of goods over much longer distances.”

• “This level of improved performance and energy cost is what optical I/O solutions like Intel’s OCI chiplet emerging bring to AI scaling.”

 

What Did Intel Executives Say?

 

• Thomas Liljeberg, Senior Director, Product Management and Strategy, Integrated Photonics Solutions Group, Intel, said, “The ever-increasing movement of data from server to server is straining the capabilities of today’s data center infrastructure, and current solutions are rapidly approaching the practical limits of electrical I/O performance.”

• [Contd.] “However, Intel’s groundbreaking achievement empowers customers to seamlessly integrate co-packaged silicon photonics interconnect solutions into next-generation compute systems.”

• [Contd.] “Our OCI chiplet boosts bandwidth, reduces power consumption and increases reach, enabling ML workload acceleration that promises to revolutionize high-performance AI infrastructure.”

 

What Is InspireSemi’s New Chip About?

 

• Through a press release published on its website, Semiconductor Holdings Inc. AKA InspireSemi announced the successful tapeout of its of its Thunderbird I Accelerated Computing chip.

• A tapeout refers to the final stage of integrated circuits (IC) or printed circuit board (PCB) designing processes before they are sent to be produced.

• The chip will now be moved to fabrication at TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company).

• As per the company, its versatile “supercomputer-cluster-on-a-chip” Thunderbird I is an advanced SOC (System on Chip), which comes with 1,536 64-bit custom RISC-V CPU cores on a single chip, which is tightly integrated with high-speed memory and low-latency networking.

• This accelerator delivers high-performance for various applications, offers energy efficiency and a “disruptive price point”.

• The chip leverages the open RISC-V CPU software ecosystem, which makes it easier and cheaper to support software written for CPUs, which forms the majority, rather than re-architecting for GPU-compatible software.

• Thunderbird I will help enhance and accelerate large graph analytics workloads, which are used in fraud detection, anti-money laundering, anti-terrorism, pharma clinical trials and supply chain management.

• InspireSemi’s initial product will comprise of an industry standard server PCIe add-in card with 4 Thunderbird devices.

• Effectively, this will deliver over 6,000 (6,144) CPU cores supporting double precision math (64-bit floating point, aka FP64).

 

What Did InspireSemi Executives Say?

 

• Ron Van Dell, CEO of InspireSemi, said, “We are proud of the accomplishment of our engineering and operations team to finish the Thunderbird I design and submit it to our world-class supply chain partners, TSMC, ASE, and imec for production.  We expect to begin customer deliveries in the fourth quarter.”

• Alex Gray, Founder, CTO and President of InspireSemi, said, “This is a major milestone for our company and an exciting time to be bringing this versatile accelerated computing solution to market.”

• [Contd.] “Thunderbird accelerates many critical applications in important industries that other approaches do not, including life sciences, genomics, medical devices, climate change research, and applications that require deep simulation and modeling.”

Do you think these innovations can revolutionize the microprocessor industry? Do you think its competitors can bring in higher-performance chips soon?

Let us know in the comments below!