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System Bits: Nov. 29


Qubit device fabbed in standard CMOS In a major step toward commercialization of quantum computing, Leti, an institute of CEA Tech, along with Inac, a fundamental research division of CEA, and the University of Grenoble Alpes have achieved the first demonstration of a quantum-dot-based spin qubit using a device fabricated on a 300-mm CMOS fab line. Maud Vinet, Leti’s advanced CMOS manager... » read more

System Bits: Nov. 23


Entanglement bonanza Quantum computers — or other quantum information devices — powerful enough to be of practical use could be closer than thought, according to researchers at MIT and IBM’s Thomas J. Watson Research Center who have shown that simple systems of quantum particles exhibit exponentially more entanglement than previously believed. They reminded that quantum computers prom... » read more

The Limits Of Parallelism


Parallelism used to be the domain of supercomputers working on weather simulations or plutonium decay. It is now part of the architecture of most SoCs. But just how efficient, effective and widespread has parallelism really become? There is no simple answer to that question. Even for a dual-core implementation of a processor on a chip, results can vary greatly by software application, operat... » read more

Teaching Computers To See


Vision processing is emerging as a foundation technology for a number of high-growth applications, spurring a wave of intensive research to reduce power, improve performance, and push embedded vision into the mainstream to leverage economies of scale. What began as a relatively modest development effort has turned into an all-out race for a piece of this market, and for good reason. Mark... » read more

System Bits: Nov. 15


Revolutionizing sports via AI and computer vision A new technology developed by PlayfulVision — an EPFL startup — will be used in all NBA games in the United States starting next year to records all aspects of sporting events for subsequent analysis in augmented reality. Will artificial intelligence and computer vision revolutionize the sports industry? PlayfulVision’s approach uses ... » read more

Samsung To Buy Harman For $8B


To fulfill a strategic priority in automotive and connected technologies for Samsung Electronics, the Korean chipmaking giant announced today it is acquiring leading Tier 1 automotive supplier Harman International Industries for $112.00 per share in cash, or total equity value of approximately $8.0 billion.  Samsung estimates the addressable market for automotive is expected to grow to mor... » read more

Architecting For Energy


Most of the time, electrical design engineers create their designs by putting in the functions first, then going back later to figure out what they can afford to shut down. But with energy harvesting, this is flipped, and the systems must be built to normally be ‘off,’ and with a clear understanding of the minimum power requirements. Also, most of the time, energy harvesting systems are ... » read more

Energy Harvesting Gains Steam


Energy harvesting is gaining traction with a surge in ultra-low-power IoT applications, ranging from inventory tracking, wearables and drones, to vibration sensors for motors in industrial settings. The idea that machines could run without batteries—or that energy could be harvested either from motion or ambient sound waves or chemical reactions to augment battery power—has been in the w... » read more

System Bits: Nov. 8


Optimizing multiprocessor programs for non-experts While ‘dynamic programming’ is a technique that yields efficient solutions to computational problems in economics, genomic analysis, and other fields, adapting it to multicore chips requires a level of programming expertise that few economists and biologists have. But researchers from MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence La... » read more

Should Processing Take Place At End Nodes?


Last week at ARM TechCon — which I found extremely interesting for the deep technical content — there was much discussion around where processing should happen in our connected world. (I’m really trying to stay away from the nebulous term, ‘IoT.’) Some believe the processing should happen at the edge nodes, while others believe it should all take place in the data center; I’ve ev... » read more

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