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More than 70,000 players in the electronics manufacturing industry are expected to descend upon SEMICON China for technology and innovation insights to accelerate already strong industry growth. March 14-16, 2018, at the Shanghai New International Expo Centre (SNIEC), SEMICON China 2018 will bring together top executives and technologists in six exhibition halls, the most ever in the event’s 30-year history, to find opportunities in key focus areas including Smart Automotive and Smart Manufacturing, Green Tech, Advanced Technology, and Power and Compound Semiconductors.

Concurrent with FPD China, SEMICON China 2018, the largest and most influential gathering of the semiconductor supply chain in China, is now open for visitor registration.

SEMICON China technical forums will address the most pressing industry topics:

  • CSTIC 2018: Staged in conjunction with SEMICON China, this has ranked among the largest and most comprehensive annual semiconductor technology conferences in China since 2000. March 11-12, 2018, CSTIC 2018 will feature nine symposiums covering all aspects of semiconductor technology, with a focus on manufacturing and advanced technology.
  • SIIP: Tech Innovation and Investment Forum: SIIP is a key international platform for semiconductor industry investment in China. Informed by China’s IC policy to fund key semiconductor sectors, leaders of China’s National IC Fund and municipal IC funds will join leaders from global investment institutions to discuss hot opportunities in China semiconductor investment – and applications such as Artificial Intelligence (AI).
  • Win-Win: Build China’s IC Ecosystem: Spurred by a strong market outlook, policy and the national fund, fab construction in China will surge over the next five years, with OSAT (Outsourced Semiconductor Assembly and Test) making strategic investments. Industry leaders will explore how China’s semiconductor manufacturing industry will strengthen its core competency, prioritize resources, revisit its business model, and thrive in the electronics ecosystem.
  • Power and Compound Semiconductor International Forum: Among the largest power and compound semiconductor industry forums in Asia, this two-day event features four sessions: Wide Band Gap Power Electronics, Optoelectronics, Compound Semiconductor in Communications, and Emerging Power Device Technology
  • Smart Automotive Forum – AI Inside: Top automotive, electronic, AI and technology executives will gather to discuss the future of the rapidly disrupting automotive industry.
  • China Memory Strategic Forum: Driven by market needs and policy support, three new Chinese Memory foundries are accelerating memory development. Industry leaders will explore ways multinationals can benefit more from China’s memory market, China can better leverage its technical strength, and Chinese companies can enhance research and development collaboration with global partners.
  • Green High-Tech Facility Forum: With more than 10 fabs now under construction in China,China’s semiconductor industry is entering a stage of rapid growth. Green Tech leaders will discuss how China can improve factory design and construction; optimize energy efficiency of semiconductor manufacturing equipment; enhance machine platform stability, chemicals and gas management, and wastewater treatment; and improve risk management.
  • Smart Manufacturing Forum: The semiconductor industry must be proactive in all aspects of smart manufacturing. This session will address automation, product tractability, cost and cycle time reduction, enhancements in productivity and yield, and efficiency improvements in front- and back-end factories.
  • Semiconductor New Technology Conference: The best way to promote new technology is through direct customer interaction and collaboration. Join this conference to discuss your new IC, new IOT solution, new machine or new material with more 200 customers from around the world.
  • 2018 China Display Conference-Emerging Display Forum: Join this forum, concurrent with FPD China 2018, to exchange ideas on emerging display technologies and future development.
  • MSIG International IOT Conference 2018: MEMS, sensors, IC, NB-IoT, 5G and smart application experts will share their insights on the IoT market and how to maximize the value of IoT applications.

SEMICON China also features three theme pavilions:

  • IC Manufacturing: See products, technologies, and manufacturing solutions focused on serving China’s fabless IC community, from design to final manufacturing.
  • LED and Sapphire: Learn how China has become the world’s largest sapphire manufacturing center.
  • ICMTIA: See the local IC material industry demonstrate its capabilities to support semiconductor industry growth.

North America-based manufacturers of semiconductor equipment posted $2.05 billion in billings worldwide in November 2017 (three-month average basis), according to the November Equipment Market Data Subscription (EMDS) Billings Report published today by SEMI.

SEMI reports that the three-month average of worldwide billings of North American equipment manufacturers in November 2017 was $2.05 billion. The billings figure is 1.6 percent higher than the final October 2017 level of $2.02 billion, and is 27.2 percent higher than the November 2016 billings level of $1.61 billion.

“November billings for North American equipment manufacturers increased modestly for the first time in four months,” said Dan Tracy, Senior Director, Industry Research and Statistics, at SEMI. “Year-to-date equipment spending is well on track to set a historical high, and we expect that positive momentum to continue into next year as new fabs in China begin to equip.”

The SEMI Billings report uses three-month moving averages of worldwide billings for North American-based semiconductor equipment manufacturers. Billings figures are in millions of U.S. dollars.

Billings
(3-mo. avg)
Year-Over-Year
June 2017
$2,300.3
34.1%
July 2017
$2,269.7
32.9%
August 2017
$2,181.8
27.7%
September 2017
$2,054.8
37.6%
October 2017 (final)
$2,019.3
23.9%
November 2017 (prelim)
$2,052.2
27.2%

Source: SEMI (www.semi.org), December 2017

 

IBM’s Khare on A.I.


December 7, 2017

BY PETE SINGER, Editor-in-Chief

Mukesh Khare, VP of IBM Research, talked about the impact artificial intelligence (AI) is going to have on the semiconductor industry during a recent panel session hosted by Applied Materials. He said that today most artificial intelligence is too complex. It requires, training, building models and then doing inferencing using those models. “The reason there is good in artificial intelligence is because of the exponential increase in data, and cheap compute. But, keep in mind that, the compute that we are using right now is the old compute. That compute was built to do spreadsheet, databases, the traditional compute.

“Since that compute is cheap and available, we are making use of it. Even with the cheap and available compute in cloud, it takes months to generate those models. So right now, most of the training is still being done in cloud. Whereas, inferencing, making use from that model is done at the edge. However, going forward, it is not possible because the devices at the edge are continuously generating so much data that you cannot send all the data back to the cloud, generate models, and come back on the edge.

“Eventually, a lot of training needs to move to the edge as well,” Khare said. This will require some innovation so that the compute, which is being done right now in cloud, can be transferred over to edge with low-power devices, cheap devices. Applied Materials’ CIO Jay Kerley added that innovation has to happen not only at the edge, but in the data center and at the network layer, as well as in the software frameworks. “Not only the AI frameworks, but what’s driving compression, de-duplication at the storage layer is absolutely critical as well,” he said.

Khare also weighed in on how transistors and memory will need to evolve to meet the demands of new AI computer architec- tures, “For artificial intelligence in our world, we have to think very differently. This is an inflection, but this is the kind of inflection that world has not seen for last 60 years.” He said the world has gone from tabulating system era (1900 to 1940) to the programmable system era in 1950s, which we are still using. “We are entering the era of what we call cognitive computing, which we believe started in 2011, when IBM first demonstrated artificial intelligence through our Watson System, which played Jeopardy,” he said.

Khare said “we are still using the technology of programmable systems, such as logic, memory, the traditional way of thinking, and applying it to AI, because that’s the best we’ve got.”
AI needs more innovation at all levels, Khare said. “You have to think about systems level optimization, chip design level optimization, device level optimization, and eventually materials level optimization,” he said. “The artificial workloads that are coming out are very different. They do not require the traditional way of thinking — they require the way the brain thinks. These are the brain inspired systems that will start to evolve.”

Khare believes analog compute might hold the answer. “Analog compute is where compute started many, many years ago. It was never adopted because the precision was not high enough, so there were a lot of errors. But the brain doesn’t think in 32 bits, our brain thinks analog, right? So we have to bring those technologies to the forefront,” he said. “In research at IBM we can see that there could be several orders of magnitude reduction in power, or improvement in efficiency that’s possible by intro- ducing some of those concepts, which are more brain inspired.”

Christos Georgiopoulos (former Intel VP and professor who was also on the panel) said a new compute model is required for A.I. “It’s important to understand that the traditional workloads that we all knew and loved for the last forty years, don’t apply with A.I. They are completely new workloads that require very different type of capabilities from the machines that you build,” he said. “With these new kind of workloads, you’re going to require not only new architectures, you’re going to require new system level design. And you’re going to require new capabilities like frameworks. He said TensorFlow, which is an open-source software library for machine intelligence originally developed by researchers and engineers working on the Google Brain Team, seems to be the biggest framework right now. “Google made it public for only one very good reason. The TPU that they have created runs TensorFlow better than any other hardware around. Well, guess what? If you write something on TensorFlow, you want to go to the Google backend to run it, because you know you’re going to get great results. These kind of architectures are getting created right now that we’re going to see a lot more of,” he said.

The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) today announced worldwide sales of semiconductors reached $37.1 billion for the month of October 2017, an increase of 21.9 percent from the October 2016 total of $30.4 billion and 3.2 percent more than last month’s total of $36.0 billion. October marked the global industry’s largest-ever monthly sales total. All monthly sales numbers are compiled by the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) organization and represent a three-month moving average. Additionally, the latest WSTS industry forecast was revised upward and now projects annual global market growth of 20.6 percent in 2017 and 7.0 percent in 2018.

“The global semiconductor market continued to grow impressively in October, with sales surpassing the industry’s highest-ever monthly total and moving closer to topping $400 billion for 2017,” said John Neuffer, president and CEO, Semiconductor Industry Association. “Market growth continues to be driven in part by high demand for memory products, but combined sales of all other semiconductor products were up substantially as well, showing the breadth of the market’s strength this year.”

Regionally, year-to-year sales increased in the Americas (40.9 percent), Europe (19.5 percent), China (19.1 percent), Asia Pacific/All Other (16.3 percent), and Japan (10.7 percent). Compared with last month, sales were up more modestly across all regions: the Americas (6.8 percent), China (2.6 percent), Europe (2.6 percent), Japan (1.8 percent), and Asia Pacific/All Other (1.5 percent).

Additionally, SIA today endorsed the WSTS Autumn 2017 global semiconductor sales forecast, which projects the industry’s worldwide sales will be $408.7 billion in 2017. This would mark the industry’s highest-ever annual sales, its first time topping $400 billion, and a 20.6 percent increase from the 2016 sales total. WSTS projects double-digit year-to-year increases across all regional markets for 2017: the Americas (31.9 percent), Asia Pacific (18.9 percent), Europe (16.3 percent), and Japan (12.6 percent). Beyond 2017, growth in the semiconductor market is expected to moderate across all regions. WSTS tabulates its semi-annual industry forecast by convening an extensive group of global semiconductor companies that provide accurate and timely indicators of semiconductor trends.

To find out how to purchase the WSTS Subscription Package, which includes comprehensive monthly semiconductor sales data and detailed WSTS Forecasts, please visit http://www.semiconductors.org/industry_statistics/wsts_subscription_package/. For detailed data on the global and U.S. semiconductor industry and market, consider purchasing the 2017 SIA Databook: https://www.semiconductors.org/forms/sia_databook/.

Oct 2017

Billions

Month-to-Month Sales                              

Market

Last Month

Current Month

% Change

Americas

7.99

8.54

6.8%

Europe

3.28

3.37

2.6%

Japan

3.14

3.20

1.8%

China

11.36

11.65

2.6%

Asia Pacific/All Other

10.18

10.33

1.5%

Total

35.95

37.09

3.2%

Year-to-Year Sales                         

Market

Last Year

Current Month

% Change

Americas

6.06

8.54

40.9%

Europe

2.82

3.37

19.5%

Japan

2.89

3.20

10.7%

China

9.78

11.65

19.1%

Asia Pacific/All Other

8.88

10.33

16.3%

Total

30.43

37.09

21.9%

Three-Month-Moving Average Sales

Market

May/Jun/Jul

Aug/Sep/Oct

% Change

Americas

6.94

8.54

23.0%

Europe

3.20

3.37

5.1%

Japan

3.04

3.20

5.2%

China

10.68

11.65

9.1%

Asia Pacific/All Other

9.77

10.33

5.8%

Total

33.63

37.09

10.3%

On October 27, SEMI China held a kickoff meeting for a new FlexTech Committee in Suzhou. FlexTech, a SEMI Strategic Association Partner, is devoted to fostering the growth, profitability and success of the flexible and printed electronics supply chain, and enabling the many smart products enabled by this new class of electronic intelligence. FlexTech offers collaboration opportunities among industry, academia, and research organizations working in the field.

Flexible, hybrid and printed electronics (FHE) are being designed into a wide range of products on the market today, in both consumer and industrial segments. These products include, components in today’s cell phones, human and health performance tools, security tags, sensor componentry in cars and airplanes, agricultural and environmental sensors, strain gauges in bridges and equipment, just to name a few.  Flexible electronic technology also intersects semiconductors, packaging, testing, materials, chemical, printed circuit boards, and display industries – for a total market size of one trillion yuan, and boosting the transformation of traditional industries in China.

China-FlexTech-photo1

Through group discussion at the meeting, Cui Zheng, researcher of SINANO of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, was elected Chairman of the committee. Zhang Jie, vice president of Changzhou Institute of Printed Electronics Industry, was elected Vice Chairman of the committee. SEMI FlexTech CTO Dr. Melissa Grupen-Shemansky gave the letter of appointment to the two appointees. Committee members hail from many different companies in the flexible, hybrid and printed electronics industry, including:

  • Applied Materials: Technology Director Sun Zhenghong
  • Beijing Institute of Graphic Communication: Professor Wang Wei
  • Beijing Sineva Technology Co., Ltd.: General Manager Zhang Mi
  • Guangdong Juhua Printing Display Technology Co., Ltd.: General Manager Fu Dong
  • Guangzhou OED Technologies Co., Ltd.: General Manager Wang Xidu
  • Guangzhou New Vision Opto-Electronic Technology Co., Ltd.: General Manager Wang Lei
  • Guangdong University of Technology:  Professor Cui Chengqiang
  • Royole Corporation: Marketing Department Director Dang Pangfeng
  • Semiconductor Institute of Chinese Academy of Sciences: Researcher Shen Guozhen
  • Shanghai Jiao Tong University: Professor Guo Xiaojun
  • Shenzhen Laibao Hi-Tech Co., Ltd.: Vice General Manager Wang Shimin
  • Sun Yat-Sen University: Professor Yang Boru

During the meeting, SEMI FlexTech CTO Dr. Melissa Grupen-Shemansky introduced FlexTech and its efforts in fostering an FHE eco-chain, including market research, R&D, and final pilot manufacturing. She expressed her optimism for strong FHE opportunities in China.

In the second half of the meeting, GM Wang Lei of Guangzhou New Vision Opto-Electronic Technology Co., Ltd. gave an introduction on the development trends of flexible OLED displays, researcher Shen Guozhen of the Semiconductor Institute of Chinese Academy of Sciences shared the research on soft sensor and multi-functional system based on low-dimensional semiconductor nanostructures, and Guangdong University of Technology Professor Cui Chengqiang presented applications for flexible packaging substrates in chip packaging.

The participants were also invited to visit the SINANO of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, where Dr. Zhang Dongyu gave a detailed introduction to the latest results of the research center.

The SEMI China FlexTech Committee will serve as an important tie between China and the global flexible hybrid and printed electronics industry.

For more information on SEMI China, visit http://www.semichina.org/index.html .

Kateeva, a developer of OLED production equipment solutions, today appointed Dr. Homer Antoniadis to the newly created role of Executive Vice President of Technology. With decades of technical and executive leadership in OLED displays and printed electronics, Dr. Antoniadis will drive the company’s technology development programs, and help customers optimize Kateeva’s YIELDjet systems for their OLED mass-production lines.

“Homer is among the early pioneers that brought OLED-enabled products into the mainstream,” said Kateeva’s President and COO, Dr. Conor Madigan. “A skilled technologist, he is particularly knowledgeable in OLED and printed electronics, with a talent for developing and productizing breakthrough technologies. His technical expertise will help us continue driving forward our applications programs in thin film encapsulation and RGB pixel deposition, and his broad technology vision will help ensure that Kateeva’s existing and new applications pipeline remains robust and focused on meeting our customers’ current and future needs. We’re thrilled to welcome Homer on board.”

“At Kateeva, I can fulfill my ambition to proliferate OLED technology while working with extraordinarily talented technologists,” said Dr. Antoniadis. “I’m excited to take a leadership role at the company.”

Dr. Antoniadis joins Kateeva from DuPont Silicon Valley Technology Center, where he served as CTO of the DuPont Photovoltaic Solutions Group following the company’s acquisition of Innovalight in 2011. Previously, he was CTO and VP of Engineering at Innovalight, a developer of silicon inks for the photovoltaic industry.

Before Innovalight, he held positions with Osram Opto Semiconductors, Hewlett-Packard Labs, and Xerox. At Osram, he led the worldwide OLED product development efforts, bringing a variety of display products from  R&D through engineering and into production. In addition, he raised funds and directed the company’s Department of Energy (DOE) Lighting Award program. Prior to Osram, he steered HP Labs’ OLED program to accomplishments that earned international recognition.

Widely recognized as an authority in the OLED and photovoltaics fields, Dr. Antoniadis is a frequent lecturer and conference chair at leading industry events. He served on the board of the International Photovoltaic Quality Assurance Task Force, as well as the PV Cell Tech Conference. In 2016, he was appointed to the National Research Energy Laboratory (NREL) External Advisory Council, and in March 2017, he was awarded the title of NextFlex Fellow.

Dr. Antoniadis has more than 70 publications in OLED displays, polymer materials, crystalline and amorphous silicon photovoltaics, and is a named inventor on more than 30 issued U.S. patents.

A native of Greece, he received his B.S. in physics from Ioannina University in Greece, and his M.S. and Ph.D. in physics from Syracuse University.

YIELDjet is a trademark of Kateeva, Inc.

Pixelligent Technologies, the inventor of PixClear high-index nanocomposites for the OLED display, HD display, and solid state lighting markets, announced today it has named Alain Harrus, Ph.D. and Gene Banucci, Ph.D. to the Pixelligent Board of Directors.

“Alain and Gene are joining the Pixelligent team at a critical time in our development as we are emerging from years of product development and application engineering, to widespread adoption of our nanocomposites across all of our target markets. The combined vast experience which Alain Harrus brings on the OLED and semiconductor equipment front, and that Gene Banucci brings from having built one of the most successful advanced materials companies, is an incredibly valuable addition to the Pixelligent team and we are honored to have them,” commented Craig Bandes, CEO of Pixelligent Technologies.

Alain Harrus is currently the CEO of Kateeva, a manufacturer of a deposition equipment platform utilizing ink jet printing, with its initial focus on mass production of OLED displays. Kateeva’s innovations are helping to accelerate the adoption of OLED and other advanced display technologies. Prior to Kateeva, Alain was a Partner at Crosslink Capital, a San Francisco-based venture capital company where he led the firm’s semiconductor and energy technology investment activities. Before Crosslink he was the CTO at Novellus Systems—now part of Lam Research. “I’m excited to be joining the Pixelligent Board as the Company is entering its inflection point and emerging as a leading provider of high-efficiency materials to the OLED and HD display markets,” said Alain Harrus. Pixelligent and Kateeva have been partnering to optimize advanced display process solutions for the OLED for the past 12 months.

Gene Banucci is the former founding CEO of ATMI.  Gene served as CEO of ATMI from 1986-2004 and remained on the Board until the company was sold for $1.1B in 2014. Under his leadership the company completed an IPO and he grew the company to $245 million in revenues when he retired.  Since retiring as CEO, he has served on over 10 Boards across numerous industries.  “I have known and worked with executives at Pixelligent and have been following the Company’s progress for the last few years.  I am impressed with the balanced approach that Pixelligent has executed on both the market-leading materials they have developed as well as their proprietary mass production manufacturing platform.  I look forward to working with the team to help firmly establish Pixelligent as a leading advanced materials supplier to the OLED and Solid State Lighting markets,” said Gene Banucci.

“These are exciting times for Pixelligent and we expect 2018 to be a record year in terms of revenues and commercial wins across all of our core OLED display, OLED lighting, HD Display, and LED lighting markets,” said Bandes.

The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) today announced worldwide sales of semiconductors reached $107.9 billion for the third quarter of 2017, marking the industry’s highest-ever quarterly sales and an increase of 10.2 percent compared to the previous quarter. Sales for the month of September 2017 were $36.0 billion, an increase of 22.2 percent over the September 2016 total of $29.4 billion and 2.8 percent more than the previous month’s total of $35.0 billion. All monthly sales numbers are compiled by the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) organization and represent a three-month moving average.

highest ever sales

“Global semiconductor sales increased sharply year-to-year in September, and year-to-date sales through September are more than 20 percent higher than at the same point last year,” said John Neuffer, SIA president and CEO. “The industry posted its highest-ever quarterly sales in Q3, and the global market is poised to reach its highest-ever annual revenue in 2017.”

Regionally, year-to-year and month-to-month sales increased in September across all markets: the Americas (40.7 percent year-to-year/5.9 percent month-to-month), China (19.9 percent/2.5 percent), Europe (19.0 percent/1.8 percent), Asia Pacific/All Other (16.8 percent/1.9 percent), and Japan (11.9 percent/0.5 percent).

“The Americas market continued to stand out, notching its largest year-to-year sales increase in more than seven years,” Neuffer said. “Standouts among semiconductor product categories included memory products like DRAM and NAND flash, both of which posted major year-to-year growth in September, as well as Logic products, which enjoyed double-digit growth year-to-year.”

TowerJazz, the global specialty foundry, announced today a partnership with Changchun Changguang Yuanchen Microelectronics Technology Inc. (YCM), a BSI process manufacturer for backside illumination (BSI) manufacturing in Changchun, China to provide the BSI process segment for CMOS image sensor (CIS) wafers manufactured by TowerJazz. This partnership will allow TowerJazz to serve its worldwide customers with advanced BSI technology in mass production, at competitive prices, starting in the middle of 2018.

The new BSI technology will be utilized for high-end photography, automotive, and AR/VR, among other growing CIS markets. This is the first time BSI will be offered by a foundry to the high-end photography market, including large formats requiring stitching.

BSI and stacked wafers are the state of the art CIS technology for higher pixel sensitivity, allowing a boost in the number of photons captured by the pixels for better picture quality in low light conditions, as well as providing higher dynamic range and higher frame rates (faster sensors).

TowerJazz and its leading customers view BSI technology as playing an important future role in the growing high-end CIS market, including DSLR high end photography, cinematography cameras, and automotive, among others. TowerJazz’s BSI offering is unique in the sense that it is focused on high-end large format, including stitched sensors. It also provides the roadmap for wafer stacking, including pixel level wafer stacking.

“TowerJazz is recognized worldwide as the leader of CMOS image sensor manufacturing platforms for high-end applications,” said Dabing Li, YCM Chief Executive Officer. “The collaboration with TowerJazz will certainly allow us to bring unique and high value technology to the market quickly and in high volume, especially to the growing Chinese market where TowerJazz already plays a significant role.”

“I am thrilled with the capabilities we developed with YCM, supporting our continued leadership in many different high-end growing markets. In addition, the excellent collaboration with YCM enables us further penetration into this very fast growing high-end CMOS camera market in China,” said Dr. Avi Strum, Senior Vice President and General Manager, CMOS Image Sensor Business Unit.  “I have very high confidence in the technical capabilities of this partnership.”

NVIDIA today announced that it is collaborating with Taiwan’s Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) to accelerate the development of artificial intelligence across Taiwan’s commercial sector in support of its recently announced AI Grand Plan to help foster domestic AI-related industries.

The collaboration — kicked off with a jointly hosted AI Symposium during NVIDIA’s GPU Technology Conference in Taiwan, which is being attended by more than 1,400 scientists, developers and entrepreneurs — calls for NVIDIA to help MOST promote AI across Taiwan through five initiatives.

“Taiwan has been the epicenter of the PC revolution, and it will serve as a key center for the next industry revolution focused on AI,” said NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang. “We are delighted to be working closely with MOST to ensure that Taiwan fully harnesses the power of this technological wave.”

“AI is the key to igniting Taiwan’s next industrial revolution, building on the long-established strength of our IT manufacturing capabilities,” said Dr. Liang-Gee Chen, Minister of Science and Technology. “Our focus is on drawing academics, industry and young talent into our AI Grand Plan to create an ecosystem based on AI innovation.”

Under the agreement, the National Center for High-Performance Computing will build Taiwan’s first AI-focused supercomputer powered by NVIDIA® DGX™ AI computing platforms and Volta architecture-based GPUs. Its target is to create a platform for accelerating advanced research and industry applications that next year reaches 4 petaflops of performance – placing it in the top 25 fastest supercomputers in the Top500 list – and 10 petaflops within four years.

In other steps:

  • MOST and NVIDIA’s Deep Learning Institute will train 3,000 developers over the next four years on the use of deep learning in smart manufacturing, the Internet of Things, smart cities and healthcare. Launched last year, the Deep Learning Institute provides hands-on training for developers, data scientists and researchers through self-paced online labs and instructor-led workshops that use open-source frameworks, as well as NVIDIA’s GPU-accelerated deep learning platforms.
  • NVIDIA is rolling out domestically its Inception program to help MOST establish its “Youth Technology Innovation and Entrepreneurship Base” for local AI startups. NVIDIA’s Inception program is a virtual incubator for startups focused on AI and deep learning, providing young companies with hardware grants, marketing support and access to NVIDIA’s larger deep-learning ecosystem. Just last week, it added its 2,000th member company.
  • NVIDIA will support MOST’s overseas talent training program for post-doctorates by offering high-level internship programs.
  • NVIDIA will provide NVIDIA Deep Learning Accelerator (NVDLA) technology for IoT and SoC devices, plus technical support, to MOST’s Project Moon Shot, AI Edge – its NT$4 billion, four-year program to use AI to increase the competitiveness of the domestic semiconductor industry by focusing on memory, sensors and edge products.

And in a related effort, MOST will provide domestic robotics experts with access to NVIDIA DGX Station™ AI deskside supercomputers and NVIDIA Jetson™ TX2 AI modules through the Central and Southern Taiwan Science Parks. NVIDIA is making available DGX-1 systems for MOST’s Formosa Speech Grand Challenge, in which 150 teams from local universities and high schools will compete at the end of October on creating networks capable of Chinese speech recognition. Taiwan’s AI Grand Plan, which was announced in August, aims to create a strong environment for fostering AI innovations and connect with industrial leadership from around the world.