Baidu and Samsung release AI chip, designed based on Samsung’s 14nm process and I-Cube package technology

Chinese-language Internet search provider Baidu and Samsung Electronics announced that Baidu’s first cloud-to-edge AI accelerator, Baidu KUNLUN, has completed its development and will be mass-produced early next year.

Baidu KUNLUN chip is built on the company’s advanced XPU, a home-grown neural processor architecture for cloud, edge, and AI, as well as Samsung’s 14-nanometer (nm) process technology with its I-Cube (Interposer-Cube) package solution.

The chip offers 512 gigabytes per second (GBps) memory bandwidth and supplies up to 260 Tera operations per second (TOPS) at 150 watts. In addition, the new chip allows Ernie, a pre-training model for natural language processing, to infer three times faster than the conventional GPU/FPGA-accelerating model.

Leveraging the chip’s limit-pushing computing power and power efficiency, Baidu can support a variety of functions including large-scale AI workloads, such as search ranking, speech recognition, image processing, natural language processing, autonomous driving, and deep learning platforms like PaddlePaddle.

Through the first foundry cooperation between the two companies, Baidu will provide advanced AI platforms for maximizing AI performance, and Samsung will expand its foundry business into high performance computing (HPC) chips that are designed for cloud and edge computing.

As higher performance is required in diverse applications such as AI and HPC, chip integration technology is becoming more and more important. Samsung’s I-Cube technology, which connects a logic chip and high bandwidth memory (HBM) 2 with an interposer, provides higher density/ bandwidth on minimum size by utilizing Samsung’s differentiated solutions.

Compared to previous technology, these solutions maximize product performance with more than 50 percent improved power/signal integrity. It is anticipated that I-Cube technology will mark a new epoch in the heterogeneous computing market. Samsung is also developing more advanced packaging technologies, such as redistribution layers (RDL) interposer and 4x, 8x HBM integrated package.

“We are excited to lead the HPC industry together with Samsung Foundry,” said OuYang Jian, distinguished architect of Baidu. “Baidu KUNLUN is a very challenging project since it requires not only a high level of reliability and performance at the same time, but is also a compilation of the most advanced technologies in the semiconductor industry. Thanks to Samsung’s state of the art process technologies and competent foundry services, we were able to meet and surpass our goal to offer superior AI user experience. ”

“We are excited to start a new foundry service for Baidu using our 14nm process technology,” said Ryan Lee, vice president of Foundry Marketing at Samsung Electronics. “Baidu KUNLUN is an important milestone for Samsung Foundry as we’re expanding our business area beyond mobile to datacenter applications by developing and mass-producing AI chips. Samsung will provide comprehensive foundry solutions from design support to cutting-edge manufacturing technologies, such as 5LPE, 4LPE, as well as 2.5D packaging.”

Accolade partners with Titan IC to boost acceleration on FPGA-based SmartNICs and ATLAS Packet conditioners

Titan IC announced on Monday a new licensing technology partnership with Accolade Technology, developer of FPGA-based SmartNICs and the ATLAS Series of Packet Conditioners. Accolade will license Titan IC’s RXP technology to accelerate complex searching and pattern matching required to deliver security solutions on their next generation SmartNIC and ATLAS platforms.

Searching large volumes of data at high speeds, the RXP hardware acceleration engine offloads processor-intensive search and analytics tasks from the host CPU, delivering search acceleration for a host of applications such as cybersecurity, Natural Language Processing (NLP), edge computing and computational storage.

Boston-based Accolade Technology will embed Titan IC’s 100Gbps RXP (Regular eXpression Processor) technology on their ANIC line of FPGA-based PCIe 1-100GE SmartNICs and ATLAS Packet Conditioners enabling line-speed processing on a host of network monitoring and cyber security applications.

Titan and Accolade will partner on delivering these solutions to both existing and new customers in the enterprise, telecom, defense and government markets.

Titan IC provides accelerated search and analytics within high-speed networks and big data worldwide. The company’s core technology, RXP, is regarded as the industry-standard for high-speed complex pattern matching, real-time Internet traffic inspection and the detection of strings, keywords and malware using regular expressions (RegEx). Licensed internationally for ASIC, SoC and FPGA designs, RXP can be found in the products of many leading vendors within the semiconductor, cybersecurity, government and data analytics markets.

As a hardware engine, RXP technology offloads RegEx processing, freeing up CPU cores and delivering faster throughput and increased efficiency for its customers. Its unique ability to handle combinations of high throughput, rule depth and complexity make it the perfect solution for a wide range of applications such as intrusion detection, deep packet inspection, SmartNIC, lawful interception, logfile analytics, in-storage search and many more.

Accolade delivers Intelligent 1-100GE FPGA-based host CPU offload PCIe SmartNICs and scalable ATLAS packet conditioners. Accolade's products and IP enables complete packet capture, deduplication, advanced packet parsing, flow shunting and packet filtering. Customers are vendors in network monitoring, cybersecurity, telecom infrastructure as well as test and measurement solutions. 

“The combination of RXP and the processing power of Accolade’s ANIC SmartNICs and Atlas Packet Conditioners creates a formidable host CPU offload solution for network monitoring and cyber security applications,” said Robbie Dhillon, CEO of Accolade. “Our strategic partnership with Titan IC will enable us to offer Accolade’s market leading SmartNICs and ATLAS Packet Conditioners to our collective customer base. As traffic volumes and throughput continues to scale, the addition of RXP as a key IP block on our SmartNIC and ATLAS products delivers significant value to our customers.”

“We are delighted to add Accolade Technology as the latest licensee of RXP and a valuable Strategic Technology Partner,” said Titan IC CEO, Noel McKenna. “RXP is fast becoming the defacto standard for search acceleration within SmartNIC devices as well as in the wider fields of cybersecurity, storage and big data analytics. Accolade’s range of ANIC SmartNIC and ATLAS Packet Conditioners are very well regarded throughout the industry and we strongly believe that RXP will play a key role in strengthening their market position.”

CloudMinds XR-1 5G humanoid robots combines artificial intelligence and human augmentation

CloudMinds Technology will have its XR-1 robot interact with guests at the Sprint exhibit (South Hall #1702) at Mobile World Congress Los Angeles, Oct. 22 to 24. XR-1 is one of the first-ever humanoid robots powered by cloud artificial intelligence, commercial Sprint True Mobile 5G and proprietary vision-controlled grasping technology for service robots that also leverages human operator input for constant learning.

To operate smart robots for people, currently CloudMinds builds and operates an open end-to-end cloud robot system, and offer it as a service to the world. Its architecture connects robots and smart devices over a secure Virtual Backbone Networks (VBNs) to Cloud AI. 

XR-1 service robots can perform tasks as a concierge, receptionist, business guide, elderly care assistant, sales promoter or, staff for VIP services under different scenarios; with task-driven conversations and vision controlled robotic manipulation.

The Human Augmented Robotics Intelligence with Extreme Reality (HARIX) platform is an evolving “cloud brain” capable of operating millions of cloud AI robots performing different tasks simultaneously. Complemented by smart joint technology (SCA), CloudmInds’ cloud AI capabilities include Natural Language Processing (NLP), Computer Vision (CV), navigation, and vision-controlled manipulation that’s bringing a vibrant cloud ecosystem of next generation robotics and smart devices to many industry value chains.

XR-1 is capable of vision-controlled robotic manipulations such as grabbing objects, opening doors, and threading a needle making it perfect as a concierge, receptionist, business guide, or VIP service staff under different scenarios.

Connected by a secure network and powered by a constantly evolving cloud brain (HARIX), XR-1 seamlessly combines artificial intelligence and human augmentation. Supported by multi-modal AI capabilities such as smart vision, smart voice and smart motion, XR-1 can acquire a number of skills, including recognizing a VIP visitor, grabbing a requested object, and opening doors.