Baidu has started manufacturing Kunlun2 processors for use in artificial intelligence applications.
🟩 How Baidu’s AI chips are used
Baidu, which is said to be China’s Google, announced that it has started mass production of its AI chip Kunlun2. The Kunlun2 chip is optimized for AI technology and is used in Internet algorithms such as voice, natural language processing, and image processing, as well as smart cities, smart industries, and biocomputing such as intelligent transportation systems and autonomous driving. Cloud, terminal, and edge computing will address a variety of needs.
2nd generation of Kunlun chips
Baidu’s first-generation Kunlun chip was introduced in 2018 and is used for search engines, autonomous vehicle platforms, and smart assistants in cloud data centers.
🟩Development of the Kunlun2 chip
Baidu started working on the Kunlun AI chip project in 2011. Initially using FPGAs to research and emulate many-core XPU microarchitectures, in 2018 it produced the first-generation Kunlun chip using Samsung Foundry’s 14nm process.
In order to commercialize AI chip design functions, Baidu spun off its semiconductor design division into an independent company and became Kunlun Chip Technology. In March 2021, the company completed a funding round evaluating nearly $2 billion in operations. Kunlun2 was developed by the spin-off Kunlun Chip Technology.
🟩Kunlun2チップの性能
Kunlun2チップはBaidu独自の第2世代XPUアーキテクチャを備えており、7nmプロセスで製造されています。前世代のKunlunチップは150ワットで256 INT8 TOPSパフォーマンスの最大3倍の性能ということで、現行のGPUでは最大規模のNVIDIA A100 624 TOPSクラスとなる。
🟩まとめ
Baidu’s AI chips are used in various AI applications from servers to smart cities.
