BrainChip Holdings Ltd. announced that it has achieved tape out of its AKD1500 reference design on GlobalFoundries' 22nm fully depleted silicon-on-insulator (FD-SOI) technology. This milestone is part of validating BrainChip's IP across different processes and foundries, empowering partners with varied global manufacturing options. The AKD1500 uses the latest features of BrainChip's extremely energy-efficient, event-based, Akida™ AI IP in combination with the GlobalFoundries' ultra-low leakage, proprietary FDX™ process technology platform, to deliver an ideal solution for always-on, at-sensor applications or other low-power embedded applications in AIoT, industrial, consumer and automotive markets.

In always-on, at-sensor use cases, Akida can completely offload feed-forward networks without the use of a CPU, which enables extremely energy efficient intelligent sensors. For other low-power embedded applications, the CPU solely performs sensor fusion processes or runs the application with Akida managing all the AI acceleration to significantly minimize CPU workload and system load, freeing up the MCU for other general-purpose computation. The AKD1500 is designed as an accelerator reference chip, using quad/octal SPI interfaces for MCU modules and PCIe for extensible cards, which assists partners in developing and demonstrating their solutions as a stepping stone to integrating the Akida IP into their production SoCs.