A new energy-efficient microchip currently being developed could revolutionize America’s defense technology.
Tachyum, a Silicon Valley semiconductor startup, says it’s breakthrough, a microchip called Prodigy, combines 3 types of chips into one: a central processing unit, a graphics processing unit, and a cutting-edge processor called an artificial intelligence accelerator, application-specific integrated circuit, or ASIC.
The benefits, says CEO Radoslav Danilak, could be a game changer.
The chip drastically reduces energy consumption, allowing companies to better handle the skyrocketing levels of electricity needed to power the cloud computing data centers of the future.
Facebook, for example, would be able to put idle servers to use (when traffic on the site is at its lowest – during overnight hours for instance), by renting out computer time on servers powered by the new chip for artificial intelligence work.
Governments will be able to maximize artificial-intelligence-powered robotic weapons and use the technology to build next-generation nuclear weapons.
5G networks are expected to facilitate technology powered by Prodigy.
Retired Army Lt. Gen. Richard Zahner, a career electronic intelligence specialist who headed signals intelligence at the National Security Agency, says Prodigy could help restore America’s technological edge.
“It’s an American design,” said Gen. Zahner. “I think the instruction set and the rest make this sufficiently different to make it challenging for the Chinese and others who might otherwise have an existent leg up. So this sort of re-levels the playing field potentially in our favor.”
Photo by Tachyum