Cerebras Systems has unveiled its Andromeda AI supercomputer. With 13.5 million cores, it can calculate at the rate of 1 exaflop — roughly one quintillion (1 followed by 18 zeroes) operations — per second using a 16-bit floating point format. Andromeda’s brain is built of 16 linked Cerebras CS-2 systems, AI computers that use giant Wafer-Scale Engine 2 chips. Each chip has hundreds of thousands of cores, but is more compact and powerful than servers that use standard CPUs, according to Cerebras, which is making Andromeda available for commercial and academic research. Continue reading Cerebras Supercomputer Calculates at 1 Exaflop per Second

Cerebras Systems has raised $250 million in a series F funding round, bringing the Sunnyvale, California-based firm’s value to more than $4 billion, according to the company. Cerebras makes what is described as the world’s fastest chip, the Wafer Scale Engine 2 (WSE-2). Investment from Alpha Wave Ventures and Abu Dhabi Growth Fund will allow Cerebras to make the CS-2 AI accelerator compute system designed around the turbo-charged WSE-2 chips available to new customers globally in what co-founder and CEO Andrew Feldman describes as the “democratization of AI.” Continue reading AI Firm Cerebras Systems Raises $250 Million in New Funding

Deep learning requires a complicated neural network composed of computers wired together into clusters at data centers, with cross-chip communication using a lot of energy and slowing down the process. Cerebras has a different approach. Instead of making chips by printing dozens of them onto a large silicon wafer and then cutting them out and wiring them to each other, it is making the largest computer chip in the world, the size of a dinner plate. Texas Instruments tried this approach in the 1960s but ran into problems. Continue reading Cerebras Chip Tech to Advance Neural Networks, AI Models

Cerebras Systems introduced its Wafer Scale Engine 2 (WSE-2) processor, which touts a record-breaking 2.6 trillion transistors and 850,000 AI-optimized cores, what the company describes as “the largest chip ever built.” Established by SeaMicro founder Andrew Feldman, Cerebras makes a massive chip out of a single wafer, unlike the typical process of slicing it into hundreds of separate chips. This is the company’s second chip that is built out of an entire wafer, wherein the pieces of the chip, dubbed cores, interconnect to enable the transistors to work together as one. Continue reading Cerebras Introduces AI Processor with 2.6 Trillion Transistors

Cerebras Systems and its partner, the Department of Energy’s National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL), revealed that its CS-1 system, featuring a single massive chip that features an innovative design, is 10,000+ times faster than a graphics processing unit (GPU). The CS-1, built around Cerebas’ Wafer-Scale Engine (WSE) and its 400,000 AI cores, was first announced in November 2019. The partnership between the Energy Department and Cerebras includes deployments with the Argonne National Laboratory and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Continue reading The Cerebras CS-1 Chip Is 10,000 Times Faster Than a GPU

Los Altos, CA-based startup Cerebras, dedicated to advancing deep learning, has created a computer chip almost nine inches (22 centimeters) on each side — huge by the standards of today’s chips, which are typically the size of postage stamps or smaller. The company plans to offer this chip to tech companies to help them improve artificial intelligence at a faster clip. The Cerebras Wafer-Scale Engine (WSE), which took three years to develop, has impressive stats: 1.2 trillion transistors, 46,225 square millimeters, 18 gigabytes of on-chip memory and 400,000 processing cores. Continue reading Cerebras Builds Enormous Chip to Advance Deep Learning

Amazon revealed last month that it had spent the previous few years building a chip for use in its worldwide data centers. It’s not alone; Apple and Google also seek to design and manufacture their own chips, as part of a cost-saving strategy. Intel, which thus far hasn’t had much competition, will feel the impact as its own customers undercut the company’s annual $412 billion in sales. Amazon’s massive need for chips means it will likely continue to buy from Intel, with which it will enjoy a better bargaining position. Continue reading Tech Companies Challenge Intel by Building Their Own Chips