Innatera Unveils Neuromorphic AI Chip to Accelerate Spiking Networks

By Sally Ward-Foxton, EETimes (July 14, 2021)

Innatera, the Dutch startup making neuromorphic AI accelerators for spiking neural networks, has produced its first chips, gauged their performance, and revealed details of their architecture.

The company has also announced that Cadence and Synopsys co-founder Alberto Sangiovanni-Vincentelli has joined the company as chairman of its board of directors. The industry veteran is currently a Professor at the University of California at Berkeley.

Innatera’s chip is designed to accelerate different SNNs for audio, health and radar applications (Image: Innatera)
The Innatera chip is designed to accelerate spiking neural networks (SNNs), a type of neuromorphic AI algorithm based on brain biology which uses the timing of spikes in an electrical signal to perform pattern recognition tasks. SNNs are completely different in structure from mainstream AI algorithms and thus require dedicated hardware for acceleration, but they typically offer significant power consumption and latency advantages for sensor edge applications.

Most other companies working on spiking neural network algorithms and hardware (for example, Prophesee) are targeting images and video streams. Innatera has decided to focus on audio (sound and speech recognition), health (vital signs monitoring) and radar (for consumer/IoT use cases such as elderly person fall sensors which maintain privacy).

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