Intel
OEM : Semiconductor
We are a world leader in the design and manufacturing of essential products and technologies that power the cloud and an increasingly smart, connected world. Our purpose is to create world-changing technology that enriches the lives of every person on earth. Our vision is to be the trusted performance leader that unleashes the potential of data.
Assembly Line
It’s arrived: Commoditization for industrial process control
With the advent of industrial process-control commoditization has come technological advancements that have expanded the boundaries of modern manufacturing–right to the computing edge. Traditionally, administrators had to walk out to a control system–USB stick in hand–and apply an update manually. Today, thanks to the combined work of Intel Corporation, Schneider Electric, and Red Hat, manufacturers can enjoy an edge-ready, software-defined, industrial control system that relieves the burden of manual effort and runs on commodity hardware and a commodity operating system and uses commodity automation techniques.
Intel's Open Source Strategy
Well, I mean, Pat always says, “Software defined, hardware enabled.” So, you can build the finest piece of hardware, but if the software is not going to run on it it’s not going to be very helpful, right? And that’s honestly the reasons that we contribute to open source all along, and we have been contributing for over two decades. Because our customers they consume our product, which is a silicon using these open-source projects. So, you pick a project OpenJDK, PyTorch, TensorFlow, scikit-learn, Kafka, Cassandra, Kubernetes, Linux kernel, GCC. And our customers who want to consume our silicon they want to make sure that these open-source projects are consumed well on the Intel silicon, they behave well, and they are able to leverage all the features that are in the instruction set of the latest edition of the chip.
Intel and Synopsys Expand Partnership to Enable Leading IP on Intel Advanced Process Nodes
Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) and Synopsys (Nasdaq: SNPS) announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement to expand the companies’ long-standing IP (intellectual property) and EDA (electronic design automation) strategic partnership with the development of a portfolio of IP on Intel 3 and Intel 18A for Intel’s foundry customers. The availability of key IP on Intel advanced process nodes will create a more robust offering for new and existing Intel Foundry Services (IFS) customers.
As part of the transaction, Synopsys will enable a range of its standardized interface IP portfolio on Intel’s leading-edge process technologies. As a result, Intel’s foundry customers will gain access to industry-leading IPs built on Intel advanced process technologies and be able to accelerate design execution and project schedules for system-on-chips (SoCs).
Schneider Electric Partners with Intel and Applied Materials to Help Decarbonize the Semiconductor Value Chain with New Catalyze Program
Schneider Electric, the leader in the digital transformation of energy management and automation, today launched Catalyze, a new partnership program aimed at accelerating access to renewable energy across the global semiconductor value chain.
Unveiled during SEMICON West 2023, Catalyze is a first-of-its kind program of collaboration among key semiconductor and technology industry leaders to address the supply chain emissions within their industry. The program joins other Schneider Electric supply chain partnership initiatives that seek to leverage the power of supply chain cohorts, including the Energize program for the pharmaceutical industry, and Walmart’s Gigaton PPA program.
MatrixSpace Secures $10M Series A Funding
MatrixSpace, a leader in AI collaborative sensing solutions, announces $10M raised in Series A funding. This brings the company’s total funding to $20M since its first year of operation in 2020 and will enable it to accelerate technology advancements, customer adoption and revenue growth. The round was led by the Raptor Group, a highly successful venture and private investment fund with a strong track record in technology, enterprise, and sports companies. Intel Capital also participated, as well as a prominent set of technology executives.
Impact Nano, chip materials startup, wins funding from Intel, Goldman Sachs
Impact Nano, a Massachusetts-based startup that makes specialty chemicals for the semiconductor industry and others, said on Thursday it raised $32 million in funding from investors including Intel Capital and Goldman Sachs Asset Management.
Stephens said Impact Nano is inventing new ways to produce chemicals that chip makers use. Among the company’s focus areas, he said, are increasing the purity of the chemicals, finding raw materials that are more abundant and comply with ethical guidelines, and making the process more environmentally friendly.
3D Glass Solutions Closes $30 Million Series C Funding Round
3D Glass Solutions Inc. (3DGS), a leading innovator of glass-based three-dimensional integrated passive solutions for radio frequency (RF), photonic and datacenters today announced the closing of a $30 million Series C financing. The round was led by Walden Catalyst Ventures, with participation from existing investors, including Intel Capital and Lockheed Martin Ventures, as well as new investments from Applied Ventures, LLC, Cambium Capital, and Mesh Cooperative Ventures.
3DGS will use this funding to increase its US based manufacturing capacity for high-volume production of superior performance 3D integrated passives and substrate products. Lip-Bu Tan, chair of Walden International and founding managing partner of Walden Catalyst Ventures, will join 3DGS’ Board of Directors.
Zurich-based UNISERS bags €13M to help semiconductor fabrication plants eliminate contaminations
UNISERS, a developer of wafer inspection and particle detection solutions for semiconductor materials, announced on Thursday that it has secured $14M (approximately €13M) in a Seed round of funding led by Intel Capital. The capital will enable UNISERS to accelerate the delivery of its commercial products to customers by 2023.
🖨️ Fabric8Labs Closes $50M Series B Financing for Electrochemical Additive Manufacturing Technology
Fabric8Labs, pioneer of electrochemical additive manufacturing, today announced the close of a $50M Series B investment round led by New Enterprise Associates (NEA), with participation from existing investors, including Intel Capital, imec.XPAND, SE Ventures, TDK Ventures, and Lam Capital. The new infusion of capital will be used to scale the company’s proprietary Electrochemical Additive Manufacturing (ECAM) technology and establish a pilot production facility.
How Chip Giant AMD Finally Caught Intel
AMFG Receives $8.5 Million in Funding Led by Intel Capital to Drive the Future of Fully Autonomous Manufacturing
AMFG Corp., a rapidly growing Manufacturing Execution System (MES) & workflow automation software for 3D printing, has secured $8.5M in funding led by Intel Capital to further catapult their spot in the new age of industrial transformation. As part of the most recent fundraise, Intel Capital investor Jennifer Ard is joining AMFG’s board of directors. With this new funding, AMFG will continue to help companies scale their additive manufacturing processes, further solidifying AMFG’s position at the forefront of the autonomous manufacturing revolution.
This financing round comes on the heels of a year of accomplishments for AMFG. These include expanding into the U.S by establishing a global headquarters in Austin, Texas, which places the company in direct contact with the region’s dramatically shifting manufacturing scene, and making strategic hires to the growing AMFG team. With this funding, AMFG will advance its vision to pioneer a path into the future of autonomous manufacturing.
Geek+ announces $100 million series E1 financing round
Geek+, a global provider of autonomous mobile robot technologies, announced today it has closed a new, $100 million series E1 funding series. Investors in the round include Intel Capital, Vertex Growth, and Qingyue Capital Investment. The company will use this funding to accelerate its global market expansion and invest in its AMR technology research and development for key product innovation.
Intel to spend €17bn on chip mega-factory in Germany
“Today 80 percent of chips are produced in Asia. Our landmark pan-European investment addresses the global need for a more balanced and resilient supply chain,” Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger said during a webcast to announce the European investment. Gelsinger said the factories will make chips using Intel’s most advanced transistor technology, though no further details or specifics were provided. The company plans to break ground on the site in the first half of 2023, and produce products by 2027.
Landing AI Secures Funding to Unlock Power of Small Datasets, Unleashing Next Era of AI
Landing AI, led by artificial intelligence visionary, Andrew Ng, developed LandingLens™, a fast, easy to use enterprise MLOps platform. It applies AI and deep learning to help manufacturers solve visual inspection problems, find product defects more reliably, and generate business value.
“You don’t always need big data to win with AI. You need good data that teaches the AI what you want it to learn,” said Ng, Founder & CEO of Landing AI. “AI built for 50 million data points doesn’t work when you only have 50 data points. By bringing machine learning to everyone regardless of the size of their data set, the next era of AI will have a real-world impact on all industries.”
The data-centric approach of Landing AI is also key to making LandingLens fast and easy-to-use. The process of engineering the data, instead of the AI software, gives an efficient way for manufacturers to teach an AI model what to do. Domain experts, not just AI experts, can now build an AI system, and take it to production. For example, rather than needing to write pages of code to train a neural network, a domain expert can do it with a few mouse clicks. This no code/low code data-centric platform enables new users to build advanced AI models in less than a day. Vision inspection projects that used to take over a year can be executed in just weeks using LandingLens.
Inside Intel’s Bold $26 Billion U.S. Plan To Regain Chip Dominance
What’s Harder to Find Than Microchips? The Equipment That Makes Them
We typically associate microchips with the latest and greatest technology, but it turns out that most of the chips that go into the products we use are made with older manufacturing techniques. No one knows precisely what proportion of the world’s microchips is made on used equipment, but Mr. Howe, owner of SDI Fabsurplus, estimates it might be as much as a third.
TSMC is expanding its capacity to make older chips by building a new plant for that purpose in Japan. Intel has no plans to build new capacity for manufacturing older kinds of chips, and continues to concentrate on making bleeding-edge chips, says Lisa Spelman, a vice president in Intel’s data-center group.
Secure device onboarding for manufacturing supply chain
FDO 1.0 can offer many benefits for manufacturers that have industrial and enterprise devices. It’s also useful with multi-ecosystem applications and services and helps streamline distributor sales. Other benefits for manufacturers include:
- Zero-touch onboarding: It can integrate with existing zero-touch solutions.
- Speed and security: It is designed to onboard with IoT devices in less than a minute, which is up to 20 times faster than it would have been for a manual installer.
- Hardware flexibility: It is designed to be hardware-agnostic and work with any microcontroller or computer processor.
- Cloud flexibility: As with hardware, it is flexible and can work with the internet and on-premise.
- Late binding: This reduces costs and complexity in the supply chain by providing a single SKU for all customers.
Late binding, in particular, is a key aspect of the process, Kerslake said. “Late binding reduces costs and complexity in supply chain, providing a single device SKU for all customers instead of making unique SKUs and creating a mess of things.”
Tools Move up the Value Chain to Take the Mystery Out of Vision AI
Intel DevCloud for the Edge and Edge Impulse offer cloud-based platforms that take most of the pain points away with easy access to the latest tools and software. While Xilinx and others have started offering complete systems-on-module with production-ready applications that can be deployed with tools at a higher level of abstraction, removing the need for some of the more specialist skills.
John Deere and Audi Apply Intel’s AI Technology
Identifying defects in welds is a common quality control process in manufacturing. To make these inspections more accurate, John Deere is applying computer vision, coupled with Intel’s AI technology, to automatically spot common defects in the automated welding process used in its manufacturing facilities.
At Audi, automated welding applications range from spot welding to riveting. The widespread automation in Audi factories is part of the company’s goal of creating Industrie 4.0-level smart factories. A key aspect of this goal involves Audi’s recognition that creating customized hardware and software to handle individual use cases is not preferrable. Instead, the company focuses on developing scalable and flexible platforms that allow them to more broadly apply advanced digital capabilities such as data analytics, machine learning, and edge computing.
Intel Accelerates AI for Industrial Applications
The human eye can correct for different lighting conditions easily. However, images collected by camera can naturally vary in intensity and contrast if background lighting varies as well. We’ve seen scale challenges observed by factories trying to deploy AI for defect detection based on the exact same hardware, software and algorithm deployed on different machines on the factory floor. Sometimes it took months for factory managers and data scientists to find out why they were getting great results on one machine with high accuracy, low false positive and false negative rates, while on the next machine over the AI application would crash.
Tractor Maker John Deere Using AI on Assembly Lines to Discover and Fix Hidden Defective Welds
John Deere performs gas metal arc welding at 52 factories where its machines are built around the world, and it has proven difficult to find defects in automated welds using manual inspections, according to the company.
That’s where the successful pilot program between Intel and John Deere has been making a difference, using AI and computer vision from Intel to “see” welding issues and get things back on track to keep John Deere’s pilot assembly line humming along.
Intel Problems
The misplaced optimism is twofold: first there is the fact that eight years later Intel has again appointed a new CEO (Pat Gelsinger), not to replace the one I was writing about (Brian Krzanich), but rather his successor (Bob Swan). Clearly the opportunity was not seized. What is more concerning is that the question is no longer about seizing an opportunity but about survival, and it is the United States that has the most to lose.
Imaging Specialist Wooptix Secures US$3.3 Million in Series-A Funding, Led By Bullnet Capital and Intel Capital
Wooptix, the first spin-off company from Universidad de La Laguna in Tenerife, Spain, has today announced a Series A funding of US$3.3 million. The funding will be used to develop Wooptix’s Natural3D software to provide advanced imaging capabilities for smartphones and other devices at full resolution.