[Intelligent Talk] Xilinx, the inventor of FPGA, has the secret weapon to break into new fields!

“While Xilinx is known as the inventor of the FPGA, it is the Zynq SoC that really drives our business in the industrial space.”

——Chetan Khona

From ordinary consumer electronics to industrial intelligent applications, and from FPGA to fully programmable devices, this is the transformation pace of FPGA technology as it continues to expand into multiple markets and adapt to more future needs.

As an FPGA chip manufacturer, how does Xilinx perform in the new fields of Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) and Medical Internet of Things (HcIoT)? On May 17, Chetan Khona, Director of Industrial, Vision, Medical and Science (ISM) Marketing at Xilinx, said in an interview with Core Master and other media: "I hope we can build smart and flexible assets for our customers."

On April 24, Xilinx released its final quarterly financial report for fiscal year 2019. Xilinx also set a record for revenue in the fourth quarter, reaching $828 million, a year-on-year increase of 30%. This fiscal year is a record year for Xilinx's annual revenue, achieving a historic breakthrough from less than $2.5 billion last year to more than $3 billion in revenue, a year-on-year increase of 24%.

Chetan Khona introduced that the ISM department (Industrial, Vision, Medical and Science Department) is Xilinx's fourth largest business unit, accounting for 1/4 of Xilinx's revenue.

Whether in the industrial or medical fields, we have seen an explosive growth in data, and a lot of data has been created. About five to ten years ago, data was only used for some local applications, but nowadays, with the advent of the Internet of Things, more and more devices have been connected to the network, so how to use this data has become a big problem.

Secondly, flexible solutions are very important. Whether it is equipment, factories or hospitals, these are very expensive assets. The more people upgrade them and provide flexible solutions, the longer the assets can be used, the longer their asset life can be extended, and the higher the return on investment.

Xilinx has provided solutions to meet the current needs for the many challenges faced by the Industrial Internet of Things and the Medical Internet of Things. Chetan Khona explained the core of Xilinx's strategy, which is to help customers use data as efficiently and effectively as possible. "At the same time, many of Xilinx's solutions use software upgrades and software flexibility. Through the flexible adaptation of hardware + software, our products are more flexible and have better performance."

"Although Xilinx has always been known as the inventor of FPGA, it is the Zynq SoC that really drives our business in the industrial field." Chetan Khona believes that size and price are very important for industrial and medical customers, and Xilinx's SoC product line can provide them with higher value in these two areas.

从赛灵思公布的ISM收入上来看，近两年，在Zynq和Zynq UltraScale+ SoC投产之后，赛灵思ISM部门的收入就得到了显著提速，达到了2.5倍。

The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) refers to a multi-dimensional, tightly coupled chain of systems involving edge devices, cloud applications, sensors, algorithms, security, confidentiality, extensive protocol libraries, human-machine interfaces (HMIs), and other elements that must interoperate.

Some describe the IIoT vision as the convergence of operational technology (OT) and information technology (IT), but the goal is actually much more far-reaching. IT refers to companies like Cisco and Huawei, OT is companies like Siemens Automation, and for the Industrial Internet of Things and the Medical Internet of Things, it is increasingly necessary to integrate these capabilities into a single device.

The most common approach to this challenge is to look for an embedded electronic component that can be used as the core of an IIoT edge system. It has the best available specifications and can easily handle unexpected situations. Chetan Khona said: "Edge systems refer to deterministic embedded communication and real-time control engines located at the edge of the network, closest to physical factories and other industrial environments, such as motion controllers, protection relays, programmable logic controllers and other similar systems."

At the same time, this embedded design requires not only software and hardware development, but cloud developers also want to connect this information to collect information from these devices. However, it is difficult for cloud developers to do so, as they need to make constant adjustments and changes. In addition, storing or processing data on the cloud will increase costs, including connection costs, storage costs, and processing costs.

However, if the data can be processed locally and then sent to the cloud, a lot of costs can be saved and its response speed can be improved. Therefore, Xilinx believes that intelligence should be defined at the edge. Chetan Khona said: "Xilinx's definition of the edge is the simulated data boundary. Our view is that being able to process data at these simulated data boundaries is the most efficient and effective way."

This also confirms the feedback from Xilinx customers: "We prefer Zynq and Zynq UltraScale+ SoC because it can provide a common platform." It is understood that the Arm system in Zynq SoC can provide services for cloud development, while also providing IT and OT support, as well as FPGA customization. Therefore, industrial performance plus customization makes our products very attractive, which is also the first reason for choosing Xilinx. According to a survey conducted by Aspencore, developers now regard Xilinx as one of the top three tools for SoC products used in future development.

Xilinx is a chip manufacturer, which is also their main business model, but for the industrial Internet of Things and the medical Internet of Things, they must provide a full range of solutions. The goal of this solution includes helping customers develop the products they need by providing secure connections, control, vision, circuits, software and artificial intelligence for better applications.

According to Chetan Khona, the world-class industrial and medical IoT solution stack, acceleration for industrial PCs using Alveo accelerator cards, and complementary edge and cloud collaboration are the three major weapons of the ISM department.

Among them, in terms of world-class industrial and medical Internet of Things solution stacks, Xilinx can provide a full range of solutions, including helping customers develop the products they need for better applications by providing secure connectivity, control, vision, lines, software and artificial intelligence.

In terms of edge AI, Xilinx acquired DeePhi Technology in 2018, bringing model pruning technology and improving efficiency. Because with the development of AI, the number of bits of calculation is constantly decreasing. In the past, it was generally recognized as 16 bits, and now it is generally recognized as 8-bit floating point and 8-bit fixed point. In the future, it may be reduced to 2 bits (BNN). Using model pruning technology, unnecessary data can be removed first, so the fps (frames per second) can be increased by 6 times with the same accuracy. It can be seen that Xilinx can support this development trend of continuously decreasing bit numbers, while many friendly companies only have one bit processing method, such as 16 bits or 8 bits, which is not flexible enough.

Speaking of the Alveo accelerator card, it is not a chip, but an integrated development board that can help customers put it into production separately. Chetan Khona explained, "After the customer uses this card, they write the software and insert it into the PC card slot. This is equivalent to the CPU acceleration card, and the acceleration performance is very obvious."

Chetan Khona added: "Xilinx is not an expert in all areas, so we will also use the expertise, technology and knowledge capabilities in a very broad ecosystem to help our customers get the solutions they need."

In 2018, Xilinx achieved strong growth in the global market. The Chinese market is different from the European and American markets and its market growth rate is faster. Xilinx has realized the uniqueness of the Chinese market. In 2018, Xilinx acquired DeePhi Technology.

"In 2019, we will have greater investments, more frequent market moves and business operations," said Chetan Khona, who said Xilinx will build on its advantages in the future industrial and IoT fields to shape future factories, future hospitals and future cities.

This article is produced by Global IoT Observer

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