Innatera aims to bring next-generation AI capabilities directly to every sensor in the world. It does this through brain-inspired microprocessors that enable advanced signal processing and pattern recognition capabilities, within an ultra-narrow power envelope. By enabling intelligent sensing, Innatera’s microprocessors unlock the true potential of sensors in portable and wearable devices that run on small batteries. Emerging application use-cases for sensors tend to be in small consumer devices, which are tremendously constrained in their (1) power dissipation, (2) size, and (3) cost, while under continuous market pressure to introduce new application features. Meeting these often contradictory requirements necessitates more powerful AI models, running on more compact and more energy efficient processing hardware. The EIC Spiking Neural Processor project aims to prototype a radical new architecture for near-sensor processing with a novel analog-mixed signal computing fabric. The project will deliver a silicon prototype that improves application performance, power dissipation, and integration density, while concomitantly realizing disruptive new functional capabilities for sensor systems.
The project’s outcomes will enable sensor systems to intelligently make sense of the data they produce, and eliminate the need to send all captured data into the cloud for processing. This will allow massive energy savings, since over 95% of captured data in common application use-cases actually contains no information of relevance. Applied to the billions of sensors sold every year, the developed technologies hold the potential to achieve CO2 reductions in the millions of tonnes annually.
