What just happened? Ampere Computing has announced that it is developing an integrated AI accelerator designed to address the growing demands of cloud-native AI computing. Called the AmpereOne Aurora, the new chip is said to offer high efficiency and can be deployed in all existing data centers.
The AmpereOne Aurora is a 512-core Arm processor with on-chip High Bandwidth Memory (HBM), designed for AI training and inference workloads. It includes a scalable AmpereOne Mesh, which the company claims allows for the "seamless connection of all types of compute." The Aurora also features integrated Ampere AI IP, a first for any Ampere product.
Aurora offers powerful AI compute capabilities for workloads like RAG and vector databases, and is said to deliver three times the performance per rack compared to the current flagship AmpereOne processors. Ampere also noted that the Aurora can be air-cooled, making it deployable in any existing data center. According to the company, it is a powerful and efficient choice for various use cases, ranging from public cloud and enterprises to hyperscale data centers and the edge.
There is no information on the exact process node used to manufacture the Aurora, but Ampere's blog post mentioned its "die-to-die interconnect across chiplets," suggesting that the company is using multiple chiplets within its proprietary scalable mesh architecture. The company also confirmed that the chip employs custom cores with proprietary AI acceleration to handle both general-purpose and AI workloads, which are increasingly converging into AI Compute in the cloud.
The data center market is currently dominated by x86-64 chips from Intel and AMD, but Ampere hopes that focusing on the AI capabilities and cloud-native design of Aurora will help it stand out from its larger competitors. However, whether it can compete effectively against these incumbents remains to be seen.
In related news, Ampere also announced the pricing for its AmpereOne M processors, which offer up to 192 cores and support 12 channels of DDR5 memory. Prices start at $2,936 for the 144-core A144-26X and go up to $5,555 for the flagship 192-core A192-32X. There is no information on whether the company plans to introduce more affordable models with a lower core count in the future.