A Hierarchical And Tractable Mixed-Signal Verification Methodology For First-Generation Analog AI Processors


Artificial intelligence (AI) is now the key driving force behind advances in information technology, big data and the internet of things (IoT). It is a technology that is developing at a rapid pace, particularly when it comes to the field of deep learning. Researchers are continually creating new variants of deep learning that expand the capabilities of machine learning. But building systems th... » read more

Week In Review: Design, Low Power


Arm is expected to list solely on a U.S. stock exchange when it goes public again later this year, forgoing the London Stock Exchange for now, the BBC reports. Global investment banks expect the offering to value the company between $30 billion and $70 billion, according to Bloomberg. Disaggregating chips into specialized processors, memories, and architectures is becoming necessary for cont... » read more

A Hierarchical And Tractable Mixed-Signal Verification Methodology For First-Generation Analog AI Processors


Artificial intelligence (AI) is now the key driving force behind advances in information technology, big data and the internet of things (IoT). It is a technology that is developing at a rapid pace, particularly when it comes to the field of deep learning. Researchers are continually creating new variants of deep learning that expand the capabilities of machine learning. But building systems th... » read more

Bug-Free Designs


It is possible in theory to create a design with no bugs, but it's impractical, unnecessary, and extremely difficult to prove for bugs you care about. The problem is intractable because the potential state space is enormous for any practical design. The industry has devised ways to handle this complexity, but each has limitations, makes assumptions, and employs techniques that abstract the p... » read more

Foundational Changes In Chip Architectures


We take many things in the semiconductor world for granted, but what if some of the decisions made decades ago are no longer viable or optimal? We saw a small example with finFETs, where the planar transistor would no longer scale. Today we are facing several bigger disruptions that will have much larger ripple effects. Technology often progresses in a linear fashion. Each step provides incr... » read more

Rethinking Machine Learning For Power


The power consumed by machine learning is exploding, and while advances are being made in reducing the power consumed by them, model sizes and training sets are increasing even faster. Even with the introduction of fabrication technology advances, specialized architectures, and the application of optimization techniques, the trend is disturbing. Couple that with the explosion in edge devices... » read more

Week In Review: Design, Low Power


The U.S. Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) issued new export controls on EDA software aimed at designing gate-all-around FETs, which manufacturers plan to implement starting at 3nm (Samsung) and 2nm (Intel and TSMC). Specifically, the ruling controls export of software that is specially designed for implementing RTL to GDSII (or an equivalent standard) for GAA FET desi... » read more

AI Power Consumption Exploding


Machine learning is on track to consume all the energy being supplied, a model that is costly, inefficient, and unsustainable. To a large extent, this is because the field is new, exciting, and rapidly growing. It is being designed to break new ground in terms of accuracy or capability. Today, that means bigger models and larger training sets, which require exponential increases in processin... » read more

Can Analog Make A Comeback?


We live in an analog world dominated by digital processing, but that could change. Domain specificity, and the desire for greater levels of optimization, may provide analog compute with some significant advantages — and the possibility of a comeback. For the last four decades, the advantages of digital scaling and flexibility have pushed the dividing line between analog and digital closer ... » read more

Architecting Faster Computers


To create faster computers, the industry must take a major step back and re-examine choices that were made half a century ago. One of the most likely approaches involves dropping demands for determinism, and this is being attempted in several different forms. Since the establishment of the von Neumann architecture for computers, small, incremental improvements have been made to architectures... » read more

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