3rd Week of September Americas Weekly IT News Summary

[1] Facebook establishes dedicated chip team 'ASIC'

Facebook has established an 'ASIC' dedicated to chips. It has been revealed that Facebook has recently hired chip engineers and is building at least one ASIC team. This plan emerged from the '@Scale' event, where Facebook announced that five chip companies would support 'Glow,' an open-source deep learning compiler. Jason Taylor, Facebook's Vice President of Infrastructure, stated in an interview with local media, "We are building a dedicated chip team focused on collaboration with Silicon Valley firms," adding that "it will be a different form from Google's TPU Deep Learning Accelerator."

[2] Startup develops GPU that surpasses AI chips

Habana, a startup company, is garnering attention for successfully developing a GPU that surpasses AI chips. Habana is raising funds to support the production of its products and appears to be pursuing a roadmap that includes sampling 16nm training chips and successors to 7nm products next year. The founder of Habana previously collaborated with Prime Sense to develop spawned depth-sensing technology for Microsoft's Kinect and Apple's iPhone X.

[3] Oulu, Finland, begins development of 6G ecosystem

The city of Oulu in Finland invited a group of journalists and began an investigation into 6G. The '6Genesis Project,' a 6G-based wireless smart society and ecosystem, focuses on the implementation of 5G communication technology, the development of 6G standards made possible by this, and the development of wireless technologies. Its main goal is to support industries that introduce 5G standards to the commercialization stage through test networks and develop and explore essential technological components that may be required for 6G. Accordingly, it is expected to focus on connectivity and distributed intelligent computing, as well as communication between devices, processes, and entities.

[4] Apple announces '7nm iPhone SoC' product family

Apple recently announced a lineup of three iPhones powered by a 7nm SoC that supports up to 512GB of memory. The new smartphone and Apple Watch models feature large screens and allow for chip upgrades. Among these devices, 5G cellular network connectivity is expected to be rolled out later this year. However, the devices support LTE Gbit/s data speeds, a feature initially supported by Qualcomm.

[5] “Microcontroller market to rise steadily over the next 5 years”

According to market research firm IC Insights, the microcontroller market is projected to grow steadily over the next five years. This growth is attributed to the proliferation of sensors and the expansion of the Internet of Things (IoT). MCU shipments are expected to increase by 18% this year, reaching 30.6 billion units. MCU revenue is projected to rise by 11% to 30.6 billion units, marking a record high this year. Next year, a 9% growth is anticipated, resulting in an additional $20.4 billion in revenue. IC Insights forecasted that "over the next five years, the market will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 7.2%, with MCU revenue reaching $23.9 billion in 2022."