News

Three architectures that could power the robotic age with autonomous machine computing

Source: Forbes, May 31, 2022 [1]
In the past few decades, the semiconductor industry has been a key contributor to our economy. The latest statistics from the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) indicate that global semiconductor industry sales totaled $555.9 billion in 2021.

Festo develops with Isaac Sim to drive Its industrial automation

Source: NVIDIA Blog, June 7, 2022 [2]
Dionysios Satikidis was playing FIFA 19 when he realized the simulated soccer game's realism offered a glimpse into the future for training robots. He set up a call with NVIDIA, and when Dieter Fox came on the call, he just asked if they were willing to work with us.

Apple announces the M2

Source: TechCrunch, June 6, 2022 [3]
Apple today announced the M2, the first of its next-gen Apple Silicon Chips. The M2 was already rumored but didn't make its debut at Apple's WWDC event. It will be found in laptops and desktops, including the new Mac Studio. Back in late 2020, Apple announced its first M1 system on a chip (SoC), which integrates the company’s customized ARM-based CPUs with its GPUs, Neural Engine for AI applications, Apple’s Secure Enclave and various signal processors and I/O controllers.

Arista's latest switches pack AMD Xilinx FPGAs to fuel high-frequency traders

Source: The Register, June 2, 2022 [4]
Arista Networks' 7130-series switches pack a CPU, FPGA, and switch ASIC into a single appliance. The company tapped an all-star cast of Broadcom, Intel, and AMD silicon to power its devices. High-frequency trading is the obvious use case for these kinds of devices.

Semiconductor growth still seen at 11% despite 2022 headwinds

Source: IC Insights, June 1, 2022 [5]
IC Insights' new quarterly update shows higher gains in microprocessors and power discretes this year, but lowers sales increases in optoelectronics. IC Insights projects semiconductor market to reach record-high sales of $680.7 billion in 2022.

First RISC-V-Based System-on-Chip (SoC) FPGA Enters Mass Production

Source: Design And Reuse, June 8, 2022 [6]
Microchip’s Mi-V ecosystem has enabled customers to ramp products based on PolarFire® devices more quickly, from prototypes to production.

Source: Arm Blueprint, June 8, 2022 [7]
Automakers are exploring the best place to run automotive real-time workloads. What is clear is that when we use computing to assist, or replace the reactions of a driver, then we must do much better than merely matching the human’s capability. We need to be tens of thousands of times better.

RISC-V researchers publish new RISC-V SoC

Source: Electropages, June 6, 2022 [8]
As RISC-V continues to increase in popularity, more architecture implementations are being developed, and one research team has demonstrated a 3-stage pipeline RISC-V SoC with various peripherals. What advantages does RISC-V present as a future CPU architecture, what did the researchers design, and could FPGAs play a key role in RISC-V development?

5G / ML Robotics ‘platforms’ have arrived, but engineering shortages remain a challenge

Source: Robotics Business Review, June 1, 2022 [9]
Technology providers such as Qualcomm are offering robotics development ‘platforms’ that incorporate ML and 5G enablers. But development platforms alone are not enough to drive robotics innovation forward, at least not until the supply robotics engineering talent exceeds demand.

AMD expands high performance compute fund to aid researchers solving the world’s toughest challenges

Source: AMD press releases, June 1, 2022 [10]
AMD announced the expansion of its High Performance Compute (HPC) Fund with the addition of 7 petaflops of computing power to assist global researchers working to solve the most demanding challenges facing society today. The AMD HPC Fund will now integrate Xilinx Heterogeneous Accelerated Compute Clusters program, providing researchers with access to AMD EPYC processors, AMD Instinct accelerators, Xilinx Alveo accelerators and Xilinx Versal ACAPs to advance research in areas including climate change, health care, transportation, big data and more.

TI keeps AI on the edge targeting accessibility at half the power consumption

Source: All About Circuits, June 6, 2022 [11]
A new family of system-on-a-chips (SoCs) from Texas Instruments (TI) aims at accessible edge AI for applications including human-machine interface (HMI) interaction.

Will Intel abandon x86 for RISC-V for its next-gen supercomputing chips?

Source: TechRadar, June 4, 2022 [12]
Intel and the Barcelona Supercomputing Centre have announced a €400 million investment in a new lab dedicated to developing RISC-V processors. The objective is to enable zettascale-class systems, roughly 1,000x more powerful than the fastest supercomputers today.

Intel’s Falcon Shores XPU to mix ‘n’ match CPUs, GPUs within processor package

Source: The Register, MAy 31, 2022 [13]
Intel releases more details on high-performance computing chips. Ponte Vecchio will combine CPUs and graphics in one package for datacenter use. The chip will compete against Nvidia's A100 and AMD's Instinct MI200 with up to 128GB of HBM2e memory.

Fueling high-performance computing with full-stack innovation

Source: NVIDIA Technical Blog, June 2, 2022 [14]
High-performance computing (HPC) has become the essential instrument of scientific discovery. Industry has embraced NVIDIA GPU-accelerated computing, bringing millionfold leaps in performance. Today, 2,700 applications can benefit from NVIDIA GPU acceleration, backed by a community of three million developers.

Previous Hardware Acceleration in Robotics Newsletters

Past ROS 2 Hardware Acceleration Working Group meetings

  1. Liu, S. (2022, May 31). Three Architectures That Could Power The Robotic Age With Autonomous Machine Computing. Forbes. https://www-forbes-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.forbes.com/sites/forbestechcouncil/2022/05/31/three-architectures-that-could-power-the-robotic-age-with-autonomous-machine-computing/amp/ ↩︎

  2. Martin, S. (2022, June 7). Festo taps Isaac Sim to drive its industrial automation. NVIDIA Blog. https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/2022/06/07/festo-isaac-sim-industrial-automation/?ncid=so-link-751514&=&linkId=100000129305239#cid=em10_so-link_en-us ↩︎

  3. Lardinois, F. (2022, June 6). Apple announces the M2. TechCrunch. https://techcrunch.com/2022/06/06/apple-announces-the-m2/?guccounter=1 ↩︎

  4. Mann, T. (2022, June 2). Arista builds Xilinx FPGAs into low-latency switches. The Register: Enterprise Technology News and Analysis. https://www.theregister.com/2022/06/02/aristas_latest_switches_pa ↩︎

  5. Semiconductor Growth Still Seen at 11% Despite 2022 Headwinds. (2022, June 1). IC Insights | Semiconductor Market Research. https://www.icinsights.com/news/bulletins/Semiconductor-Growth-Still-Seen-At-11-Despite-2022-Headwinds/ ↩︎

  6. First RISC-V-Based system-on-Chip (Soc) FPGA enters mass production. (2022, June 8). Design And Reuse. https://www.design-reuse.com/news/52094/microchip-risc-v-soc-fpga.html ↩︎

  7. Rill, B. (2022, June 8). 25,000 times faster than the blink of an eye: The rise of real-time in the car. Arm Blueprint. https://www.arm.com/blogs/blueprint/automotive-real-time-control ↩︎

  8. Mitchell, R. (2022, June 6). RISC-V development continues with researchers publishing new RISC-V soc. Electronics News for Components & Design Innovation - Electropages. https://www.electropages.com/blog/2022/06/risc-v-development-continues-researchers-publishing-new-risc-v-soc ↩︎

  9. Polly, A. (2022, June 1). 5G / ML robotics 'Platforms' have arrived, but engineering shortages remain a challenge. Robotics Business Review. https://www.roboticsbusinessreview.com/opinion/5g-ml-robotics-platforms-have-arrived-but-engineering-shortages-remain-a-challenge/ ↩︎

  10. AMD Expands High Performance Compute Fund to Aid Researchers Solving the World’s Toughest Challenges. (2022, June 1). AMD. https://www.amd.com/en/press-releases/2022-06-01-amd-expands-high-performance-compute-fund-to-aid-researchers-solving-the ↩︎

  11. Hertz, J. (2022, June 6). TI Keeps AI on the Edge Targeting Accessibility at Half the Power Consumption. All About Circuits. https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/news/ti-keeps-ai-on-the-edge-targeting-accessibility-at-half-the-power-consumption/ ↩︎

  12. Khalili, J. (2022, June 4). Will Intel abandon x86 for RISC-V for its next-Gen supercomputing chips? TechRadar. https://www.techradar.com/news/will-intel-abandon-x86-for-risc-v-for-its-next-gen-supercomputing-chips ↩︎

  13. Martin, D. (2022, May 31). Intel gives update on Rialto Bridge GPU, falcon shores XPU. The Register: Enterprise Technology News and Analysis. https://www.theregister.com/2022/05/31/intels_falcon_xpu/ ↩︎

  14. Eassa, A., & Porter, C. (2022, June 3). Fueling high-performance computing with full-stack innovation. NVIDIA Technical Blog. https://developer.nvidia.com/blog/fueling-high-performance-computing-with-full-stack-innovation/ ↩︎