According to a report by 36Kr, China’s EV maker, XPeng Motors, has successfully completed the tape-out process for its self-developed intelligent driving chip.

Sources cited by the report further reveal that XPeng’s intelligent driving chip is specifically designed to meet AI demands, including end-to-end large models. The product is considered to be is a central computing architecture chip that supports integrated cabin and driving functionalities.

The AI computing power of this chip is said to be equivalent to that of three mainstream intelligent driving chips.

Additionally, the report mentions that on August 27th, during XPeng’s 10th anniversary and the launch event for the M03 model, XPeng Motors will officially release details about its self-developed chip.

In response to the rumors surrounding the unveiling of XPeng’s self-developed chip, as per the report, XPeng’s Chairman and CEO hinted on his personal social account that the company certainly won’t disappoint.

Previously, NIO, another automobile manufacturer in China, had also announced the successful tape-out of its 5nm autonomous driving chip, the NX9031.

The tape-outs of self-developed chips marks the beginning of a new phase in which automakers are further competing to enhance the efficiency of intelligent driving software and hardware.

Per a previous report by 36Kr, it was noted that XPeng began building its chip team in 2020. Initially, XPeng collaborated with the U.S. chip design company Marvell, but the partnership did not go smoothly.

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(Photo credit: XPeng)

Recently, two industrial moves took place in Shanghai’s integrated circuit (IC) sector.

First, the Shanghai Integrated Circuit Industry Investment Fund (Phase II) Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Shanghai IC Industry Fund Phase II”) received a substantial capital increase.

Second, 14 key IC-related projects were signed and officially launched in Shanghai’s Lingang area on August 19, involving companies such as SICC, JHETECH, SIMIC, and Shanghai Institute of IC Materials (SICM) with a total investment of CNY 28.8 billion.

• The Capital of Shanghai IC Industry Fund Phase II Increased to CNY 14.5 Billion

Recently, the business registration information of Shanghai IC Industry Fund Phase II was updated, showing a significant increase in registered capital from CNY 7.6 billion to CNY 14.53 billion. Moreover, Shanghai Pudong Innovation Investment Development (Group) Co., Ltd. was added as a new shareholder, and some key personnel changes were made.

The Shanghai IC Industry Fund was founded in 2020. In June 2024, Shanghai AST announced the successful completion of its Series C financing round, with Shanghai IC Industry Fund Phase II among the investors, which has also invested in companies such as Hailin Microelectronics, SMIC, JCET, and GTX.

It is worth noting that this is the second capital increase for Shanghai IC Industry Fund Phase II. It’s learned that the fund’s initial registered capital was CNY 5.4 billion, which increased to CNY 7.6 billion in January 2022.

• Several IC Industry Funds Established

In 2016, Shanghai Integrated Circuit Industry Investment Fund Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Shanghai IC Industry Fund Phase I”) was established with an initial fundraising scale of CNY 28.5 billion, making it the largest local IC industry fund in China at that time, with a focus on investing in IC manufacturing sector.

The National Integrated Circuit Industry Investment Fund ( “Big Fund”) was among the investors, currently holding a subscribed capital of CNY 3 billion and a 17.01% stake.

Up till now, Shanghai IC Industry Fund Phase I has invested in 14 companies, including HLMC Microelectronic, Hailin Microelectronics, Everdisplay, SMIC, GTA, HLMC IC, SouthChip, Zhaoxin, Unisoc, InnoGrit, and ACM, covering areas such as design, manufacturing, and equipment.

In July 2024, following the establishment of Shanghai IC Industry Fund Phase I and Phase II, Shanghai took further action by setting three new leading industry mother funds. It is reported that the funds invested a total of CNY 89.003 billion, respectively targeting three major industries: IC, biomedicine, and AI.

Among these, the IC mother fund has a capital of CNY 45.001 billion, focusing on areas including but not limited to IC design, manufacturing, packaging and testing, equipment materials, and components.

The AI mother fund, with a scale of CNY 22.501 billion, eyes fields such as intelligent chips, intelligent software, autonomous driving, and intelligent robots.

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(Photo credit: JCET)

On August 19, AMD announced its acquisition of ZT Systems, a cloud computing and AI data center equipment designer, for a total value of USD 4.9 billion. This move is intended to strengthen AMD’s AI computing capabilities, while hinting at its challenge to NVIDIA’s dominance in the AI market.

AMD plans to complete the acquisition in the first half of next year. Industry sources cited in a report from Economic Daily News interpret this move as AMD’s strategy to expand its AI chip market reach, extending its influence from chip design to system integration in the AI sector.

AMD CEO Lisa Su stated in an interview that ZT Systems generates over USD 10 billion in annual revenue, nearly half of AMD’s reported USD 22.7 billion revenue last year.

However, AMD plans to sell off ZT Systems’ manufacturing business after the acquisition is completed, while retaining its system design business. Per a report from Reuters, Su further explained that this decision is because AMD has no plans to compete with companies like Super Micro Computer.

“Our acquisition of ZT Systems is the next major step in our long-term AI strategy to deliver leadership training and inferencing solutions that can be rapidly deployed at scale across cloud and enterprise customers,” said Lisa Su.

AMD will be able to offer a broader range of chips, software, and system designs to large data center clients like Microsoft and Meta after acquiring ZT Systems.

AMD also noted that once the acquisition is finalized, ZT Systems CEO Frank Zhang will remain in his position. In the statement, Frank Zhang expressed that joining AMD will help ZT Systems play a larger role in designing AI infrastructure that defines the future of computing.

Regarding concerns about the potential impact of AMD’s acquisition of ZT Systems on NVIDIA chip supplies, one of ZT Systems’ major shareholders Inventec reassured that existing orders for H100, H200, and GB200 chips will remain unaffected. Current collaboration projects will continue as planned, and the customer base will not change.

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(Photo credit: AMD)

As global competition heats up in the AI sector, an emerging power has now joining the battlefield. Ola, an automotive manufacturer in India, plans to launch the country’s first in-house AI chip by 2026, which is based on ARM architecture, according to a report by Wccftech.

Though there are more details yet to be revealed, the report notes that Ola did highlight its key chip offerings, featuring the Bodhi series, which would be the nation’s first self-developed AI chips. The company’s product lineup also reportedly includes the Sarv-1 cloud-native CPUs and the Ojas edge AI chip.

When asked about the potential foundry partners in the future, Ola’s CEO Bhavish Aggarwal mentioned that the company plans to collaborate with a global tier I or II foundry, likely TSMC or Samsung, according to the report.

Ola’s AI lineup is expected to start with the Bodhi-1 AI chip, which is specifically designed for large-scale LLMs, with a focus on inferencing workloads, Wccftech suggests. Positioned as a low-to-mid-tier offering from Ola, the chip is said to be launched by 2026, followed by a more potent successor, the Bodhi-2, slated to be released in 2028.

According to Wccftech, it is worth noting that Ola also introduced an edge AI chip named Ojas, which is likely to be integrated into Ola’s next-generation electric vehicles. In addition, the Sarv-1, specifically designed for cloud computing, is expected to feature ARM Neoverse N3 cores, though this hasn’t been confirmed yet, the report states.

As the world’s fifth largest economy, India seems to be relatively slow in developing its own AI chips. China, the world’s largest developing country, has quite a long history in developing in-house AI chips.

Chinese tech giant Huawei is said to be testing its latest processor, the “Ascend 910C,” with internet companies and telecom operators recently. Reportedly, the company has informed potential customers that this new chip is comparable to NVIDIA’s H100 GPU, which cannot be directly sold in China.

On the other hand, Baidu’s foray into AI chips can be traced back to as early as 2011. After seven years of development, Baidu officially unveiled its self-developed AI chip, Kunlun 1, in 2018. T-Head, owned by Alibaba, introduced its first high-performance AI inference chip, the HanGuang 800, in September 2019.

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(Photo credit: Krutrim)

According to TrendForce’s “2024 Global GaN Power Device Market Analysis Report”, the development of the GaN power device industry is expected to accelerate once again as Infineon and Texas Instruments allocate more resources into GaN technology.

In 2023, the market size of global GaN power device was around USD 271 million, and it is projected to grow to USD 4.376 billion by 2030 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 49%.

Notably, the proportion of non-consumer applications is expected to increase from 23% in 2023 to 48% by 2030, with automobile, data center, and motor drive being the core application scenarios.

• GaN Expected to Make Great Difference in Reducing Heat and Improving Efficiency in AI Era

The evolution of AI technology has driven the continuous increase in computing power demand, making the power consumption of CPU and GPU an increasingly striking issue. To meet the requirements of more advanced AI computations, server power supply is required to further enhance efficiency and power density, and thus, GaN has emerged as a key solution.

Delta, the world’s largest server power supply provider, holds nearly 50% of the market share. Observing the advancement of its server power supplies, the power density has increased from 33.7W/in³ to 100.3W/in³ over the past decade, while power levels has reached 3.2kW and even 5.5kW, and the next generation is expected to exceed 8kW.

TrendForce’s research indicates that AI server is expected to account for 12.2% of overall server shipment in 2024, an increase of ~3.4% from 2023, while the annual growth rate for general server shipment is only 1.9%.

In face of such an attractive opportunity, both Infineon and Navitas Semiconductor have announced technical roadmaps for AI data center this year.

Infineon highlights the significant advantages of combining liquid cooling technology with GaN at lower junction temperature, which will enable data center to maximize efficiency, meet the growing power demands, and overcome the challenges posed by server heat increase.

• Potential of GaN’s High-Frequency Characteristics can be Fully Tapped in Motor Drive Applications

In motor drive applications like robotics, the potential of GaN is gradually emerging. Compared to industrial robots, humanoid robots have a significantly higher degree of freedom (DoF), greatly increasing the demand for motor drivers.

It’s learned that the joint modules of humanoid robots bear the main tasks of exertion and braking. To achieve higher explosive power, motor drivers with high power density, high efficiency, and high responsiveness are needed. As a result, GaN has attracted market attention, especially in load-bearing areas like the legs.

Texas Instruments and EPC (Efficient Power Conversion) have been dedicated to driving GaN’s application in the motor drive field, drawing new players into the market.

Robotics is expected to embrace a future beyond imagination, where precise, fast, and powerful motion capabilities are crucial, and the motors driving these movements will inevitably advance forward, which will be a boon for GaN.

• GaN Provides New Solutions for Automotive Power Electronics

While SiC thrives in the automotive industry, GaN is also gaining traction in this field, with on-board chargers (OBC) considered the best entry point.

The first automotive-grade GaN power product meeting AEC-Q101 standard was released by Transphorm (now Renesas) in 2017, and several manufacturers have since introduced a wide range of automotive-grade products so far.

Overall, although GaN still faces several technical challenges in entering inverter and OBC power system, it is believed that with continuous investment from major automotive chip companies like Infineon and Renesas, GaN will soon become a key component in automotive power systems.

• Consumer Electronics Remain the Main Applications for GaN

Consumer Electronics still holds the biggest proportion among GaN power device applications, in which GaN’s footprint is quickly expanding from fast chargers to home appliances and smartphones.

Specifically, GaN has been widely adopted in low-power smartphone fast chargers, and next will enter into more demanding applications like notebook and home appliance power supplies. Other potential consumer applications include Class-D audio, smartphone over-voltage protection (OVP), etc.

TrendForce believes that GaN power device industry is at a critical breakthrough moment, with several potential applications simultaneously boosting rapid growth.

Moreover, new structures and processes are expected to be introduced in built on better reliability to get into more complex high-power, high-frequency scenarios, injecting new momentum into the industry.

In terms of industry development and market landscape, Fabless companies have been particularly active in the past.

However, as the industry continues to consolidate and the application markets gradually open up, traditional IDM (integrated device manufacturer) giants are expected to gain significant influence, bringing new major changes to the future landscape of the industry.

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(Photo credit: Infineon)