Achronix Semiconductor Corporation has been recognized by CIOReview Magazine as the recipient of “Top 20 HPC Solution Companies - 2018,” based on our proprietary methodology, reflecting its position in the industry. This profile has been developed by the CIOReview research and editorial team based on insights from an interview with Steve Mensor, VP of Marketing.

Achronix Semiconductor Corporation
Pushing Boundaries in High-performance Compute Market

Steve Mensor, VP of Marketing

Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) are increasingly being used as processing elements in high-performance compute applications such as AI/ ML, cryptocurrency and 5G wireless infrastructure that, until recently, were reserved for traditional CPUs. A typical setup here is a dual-processing system with the ASICs acting as an accelerating co-processor offloading and enhancing the performance of the CPU. However, key challenges in leveraging ASICs for HPC workloads are lack of adaptability and programmability on-chip. With algorithms evolving or changing regularly for high-performance compute applications, taping out a new chip is the only option to adapt the ASIC, which is expensive (costs running in tens of millions of dollars) and takes many months to complete. This results in slower time-to-market and in turn loss of market share due to increased competition from incumbents or new players entering the space.

Achronix Semiconductor Corporation, a California-based firm, addresses this challenge and helps businesses push the boundaries of the high-performance compute market by providing embedded Field Programmable Gate Array (eFPGA) solutions. With Speedcore™ eFPGAs, a new or more efficient algorithm can be easily downloaded and updated in the ASIC as required, avoiding the need to make a new chip. Historically, companies have either used standalone FPGAs (for flexibility, programmability) or ASICs (for high-performance, high-volume applications). But Achronix’s Speedcore eFPGA defines a new paradigm in data acceleration for HPC applications by combining the flexibility and programmability of FPGAs with the performance and specialized application implementation of ASICs.

“High-performance compute applications require new and innovative approaches, and Achronix is leading the HPC market with the Speedcore eFPGA solutions,” remarks Steve Mensor, Vice President of Marketing, Achronix Semiconductor Corporation.

High-performance compute applications require new and innovative approaches, and Achronix is leading the HPC market with the Speedcore eFPGA solutions

Standalone FPGAs are a convenient solution for some applications, but Speedcore eFPGA takes the concept to the next level, supporting low-latency and high-throughput communications with cost savings for high-volume applications. Compared to separate standalone FPGA products, Speedcore eFPGA provides benefits that include ten times higher bandwidth, hundred times lower latency, ten times lower system cost and fifty percent lower power.

Speedcore eFPGA is linked to an ASIC through a wide parallel interface, providing higher throughput, with latency counted in single-digit clock cycles. Also, eFPGAs die size is smaller than standalone FPGAs. Traditional FPGAs have high pin counts packages, forcing designers to manufacture a printed circuit board (PCB) with many layers. Achronix’s eFPGAs eliminate the need for specialized PCBs, as well as support components such as power regulators, clock generators, level shifters, and passive components.

In its 14-years of the voyage, Achronix has already established itself as one of the fastest growing semiconductor companies in 2017 with revenues grew over 700 percent year-over-year and exceeded $100 million. Going forward, the company aims to expand its product portfolio with an investment in its next-generation FPGAs built on TSMC’s 7nm process technology.

Achronix Semiconductor Corporation

Achronix To Participate at the Oppenheimer Technology, Internet & Communications Conference on August 8

Thursday, July 27, 2023

SANTA CLARA - Achronix Semiconductor Corporation, a leader in high-performance FPGAs and embedded FPGA (eFPGA) IP, today announced that President and CEO, Robert Blake, and CFO, Mahesh Karanth, will participate at the Oppenheimer Technology, Internet & Communications Conference on August 8, 2023, which will be held as a virtual event. Management will be available throughout the day to meet with investors attending the conference.

Portfolio managers and analysts who would like to request a meeting with management should contact their Oppenheimer representative.

Achronix Announces FPGA-Powered Accelerated Automatic Speech Recognition Solution

Friday, October 13, 2023

SANTA CLARA, Calif., -- Achronix Semiconductor Corporation , a leader in high-performance FPGAs and embedded FPGA (eFPGA) IP, is proud to announce its latest innovation in partnership with Myrtle.ai — an accelerated automatic speech recognition (ASR) solution based on the Speedster7t FPGA. This transformative solution converts spoken language to text in over 1,000 concurrent real-time streams with high accuracy and fast response times while delivering up to a 20 times improvement in performance over competing solutions. Achronix will demonstrate this solution at the upcoming SC23 conference in Denver on November 12-17, 2023, at booth 2019.

The solution is powered by a VectorPath accelerator card featuring a Speedster7t FPGA running Myrtle.ai's Achronix-FPGA-optimized ASR IP — delivering industry-leading, real-time, ultra-low latency speech-to-text capabilities. A single card in a server can replace up to 20 CPU-only-based servers or 15 GPU cards. The AI model can be easily customized to trade off accuracy versus performance when support for 1,000 concurrent streams is unnecessary. It is poised to disrupt the ASR landscape with its exceptional word-error rate and 99th percentile latency of 54 ms end-to-end, including pre- and post-processing plus data movement back and forth to the CPU. In addition, the solution can be customized or retrained with vertical-specific or custom data sets in standard machine learning (ML) frameworks.

"One of the key aspects of the Myrtle.ai accelerated ASR solution built on Achronix Speedster7t FPGAs is its ability to reduce both OpEx and CapEx while maintaining top-tier performance significantly," noted Bill Jenkins, the Director of AI Product Marketing at Achronix. "This solution powered by a Speedster7t FPGA can reduce costs by up to 90% compared to traditional CPU/GPU-based server solutions, whether enterprise or in the cloud. This capability translates to tangible business savings while providing exceptional real-time speech-to-text capabilities."

The Myrtle.ai state-of-the-art ASR accelerator IP running on a Speedster7t FPGA and software stack abstracts away the fact that the FPGA powers the solution, making for easy adoption. This solution is poised to redefine how industries process speech data with its demonstrated superiority over competitive GPU-based solutions, delivering a 16 times better performance-to-cost ratio.

"The architecture of the Achronix Speedster7t FPGA with its 2D network on chip (NoC) and ML processor (MLP) arrays gave us the building blocks required to create an ASR product that is significantly more optimized than anything available on the market today," said Peter Baldwin, CEO of Myrtle.ai, a company known for its expertise in optimizing low-latency ML inference for real-time applications. "The extremely low latency inherent in these FPGAs makes them ideal for real-time workloads. We are excited to provide users the ability to scale up their ASR services at lower cost and faster than ever before."

The Achronix-Myrtle.ai accelerated ASR solution will have a revolutionary impact on industries that depend on rapid and accurate speech-to-text conversion. Its features include compatibility with major deep learning frameworks such as PyTorch, plus re-trainability for multiple languages or specialties. The solution is currently being deployed with our early-access customers and is now available to the general market. Evaluate the solution today with your own data set and schedule a detailed discussion and demonstration with our team: Contact Achronix and review our ASR solution page on our website.

Company
Achronix Semiconductor Corporation

Management
Steve Mensor, VP of Marketing

Description
Provides high-performance FPGA and embedded FPGA (eFPGA) solutions

Achronix Semiconductor Corporation Pushing Boundaries in High-performance Compute Market