Intel Follows Qualcomm Down Neural Network Path

Peter Clarke, Electronics360
June 23, 2014

One of the reasons Intel Corp. is interested in putting FPGA die next to its Xeon processors (see Intel to Package FPGA with Xeon Processor) is so that it can deploy neural networks along side its x86 processors. Of course, in the longer term Intel could try to go for monolithic implementation of CPU cores and FPGA fabric if it can obtain the appropriate IP.

Neural networks often implemented as software on conventional processors, including x86 architecture processors, were a hot topic 25 years ago as the first software simulations of weighted summing networks started to show the interesting ability of being able to learn how to process data. However, in those days networks of a few 10s or 100s of neurons represented a practical limit, and fell a long way short of the biological systems on which they were based.

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