InspireSemi Is Paving the Way for the Next Generation of AI

InspireSemi's research indicates that high-performance compute (HPC), artificial intelligence (AI), and graph analytics compute solutions are no longer good enough. They are expensive, hard to program, and power-heavy. To overcome these challenges, they have created their 12nm system on chip (SoC), Thunderbird, which is disrupting the next generation of accelerated compute on many levels, including raw performance, broad applicability, lower energy consumption, and affordability. Benchmarks indicate that Thunderbird performs at up to 24 TFLOPS, with an energy efficiency of 75 GFLOPS/watt, resulting in a 30-60% reduction in energy consumption.

Thunderbird's all-CPU architecture makes it easier to program and allows it to be applied to all HPC and AI applications, including important simulation and modeling applications in automotive, aerospace, cybersecurity, genomics, and more. It packs 1,536 64-bit custom RISC-V CPU cores on a single chip, tightly integrated with high-speed memory and low-latency networking, making it more versatile than GPUs. Cadence tools have played a crucial role in the successful tapeout of the Thunderbird SoC, and since the tapeout's announcement, InspireSemi has received many accolades. Industry leaders have been working with them on Thunderbird, including national labs such as Sandia and Oak Ridge and the Texas Advanced Computing Center at the University of Texas, Austin.

InspireSemi's product philosophy revolves around optimizing performance and power efficiency to ensure rapid time to market for their customers. Cadence's leadership and innovative signoff technology for advanced-node design played a key role in their decision to adopt the Cadence digital full flow. The Cadence digital full flow has enabled InspireSemi to expedite their design convergence with all signoff engines tightly integrated within the Innovus Implementation System.

By utilizing the foundry-certified Quantus Extraction Solution for extraction and Tempus Timing Solution for static timing analysis and final signoff, InspireSemi significantly reduced their signoff closure iterations with these signoff engines tightly integrated inside the Innovus system, allowing them to converge faster in meeting tight tapeout deadlines.

Tom Fedorko, chief operating officer of InspireSemi, said, "The overall performance and quality of the Cadence digital full flow served as the linchpin of our successful on-time design closure. Looking ahead, our collaboration with Cadence remains essential to our mission together." Learn more about how InspireSemi is paving the way for the next generation of AI.

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