The popularity of "lobster" and "Hermes" has kicked offintelligent agentThe era of Agentic AI has begun. Since its development at the beginning of the year, AI agents have become the only main thread running through fields such as smart terminals, applications, models, computing power, and embodiment.
How to build a solid "AI computing infrastructure" for the era of intelligent agents has become a focal point for tech giants and startups. As the computing paradigm moves beyond the stage of pursuing the ultimate performance of a single chip,Overall system efficiency, energy efficiency, and costThese factors have become more critical considerations for businesses.
Towards the era of intelligent agents, findA computing platform that is more suitable for its own business needs and is more efficient and cost-effective has become a "must-have" for almost every player in the AI field.
01.
AI computing power revolution is a foregone conclusion.
A new solution is urgently needed to break the deadlock in the chip industry.
Today, AI is rapidly moving from the cloud to the edge, and in the Internet of Things (IoT) field, represented by AIoT, devices...From "sensory connectivity" to "intelligent computing"Many embedded devices face multiple resource constraints, including performance, power consumption, latency, and storage, and urgently need breakthroughs at the chip level.
At the same time, the rapid improvement of small and medium-sized models accelerates the deployment of intelligent agents on the edge. As the core engine of AI inference, the NPU faces new challenges in terms of accuracy support, memory bandwidth, computing efficiency, and ecosystem compatibility.
BodyIn this field, from the evolution of the robot's "brain," "eyes," and "hands" to the robot's ability to truly perceive physical reality and interact with humans, solid support at the chip level is essential.
cloudThe surge in inference demand has made it increasingly urgent for tech giants to find solutions with advantages in energy efficiency, power consumption, and cost. The era of "big chips" is over, and the computing power market is booming, bringing massive opportunities.
From the edge and side, to the embodiment and the cloud.The AI computing power revolution is imminent.This brings a series of new opportunities and challenges to the chip industry, and the creation of these excellent chips cannot be separated from the support of underlying key IP technologies and solutions.
Given this industry trend, Arm Technology, as a provider of core underlying IP and solutions, has unhesitatingly chosen to fully embrace AI. Its goals in the AI era are extremely clear: set last year...AI Arm ChinaStrategic development direction and"All in AI" Product Strategy—A full-scale sprint toward the AI era.
Achieving this goal requires the steady and pragmatic implementation of products and technologies.From the "Zhouyi" NPU, "Xingchen" CPU, and "Shanhai" SPU to the "Linglong" multimedia series VPU,Its four product lines have been continuously innovating and iterating around AI over the past year.
While focusing on product development, Arm Technology also officially established its [missing information] this year.Edge AI, Physical AI and Cloud AIThe three main business lines further clarify and strengthen the company's close follow-up to the AI trend, from the release of AI strategy to the development and implementation of products, and from products to AI industry empowerment, forming a perfect closed loop.
02.
Four major product lines are accelerating their "evolution".
AI is both a direction and a path.
The success of a grand strategic narrative stems from the solid implementation of every product and technological detail.Arm Technology's four major product lines—NPU, CPU, SPU, and VPU—have brought many surprises to the industry over the past year, with numerous noteworthy technological innovations centered around AI. The recent debut of a series of eye-catching new products at WAIC is another milestone in its "All in AI" strategy.
Among them, it is built on Arm's mature ecosystem."Star" 300 AIoT prototype platform,This is another major move by Arm Technology in the core IoT field of edge computing, featuring a heterogeneous computing platform specifically designed for embedded AI scenarios.
This prototype platform isArm's self-developed "Starry Sky" CPU, Arm Helium vector extension technology, and Arm Ethos NPU are highly efficient combinations.Helium technology acts like a "software-programmable accelerator," enabling CPUs to process vector calculations more efficiently.
The platform's first-generation product, codenamed "Star 300," fully supports mainstream small models and extends AI computing power at the MCU level, providing more embedded devices with a more effective and cost-efficient AI implementation technology path.
The Zhouyi X3-Pro is a high-efficiency computing platform specifically designed for intelligent agents across all scenarios.It was also revealed for the first time that it is programmable, dedicated and highly efficient, and future-oriented and scalable. It adopts a unified, layered and scenario-based NPU computing architecture, which can be adapted once and reused in multiple chips, and can be flexibly configured for different scenarios.
The "Zhouyi" X3-Pro can be flexibly adapted to various product configurations, covering all scenarios from low-power IoT devices to high-performance edge servers. It is believed that the upcoming "Zhouyi" X3-Pro series products can lower the deployment threshold of AI intelligent agents, significantly improve R&D efficiency, and accelerate the deployment of AI intelligent agents on every edge device.
From last year's "Zhouyi" X3 NPU IP, designed specifically for large models, to this year's upgraded version with improvements in peak computing power and computing density, enhancing model deployment smoothness and cost-effectiveness, and now to the breakthrough of the "Zhouyi" X3-Pro in the field of intelligent agents...Arm Technology's core NPU IP has been iterating and evolving in line with the core trends of AI.
In response to the ever-increasing demand for high-quality video processing in the AI era, enabling AI to better understand and comprehend the world, Arm Technology unveils for the first time...The next-generation AI VPU "Wudang"It can also be described as a comprehensive upgrade.
It inherits the CAE technology of the previous generation, with PPA improved by more than 40% compared to the previous generation. It supports more comprehensive encoder specifications and, based on the new AI VPU training framework, can achieve "end-to-end global optimization". The measured bit rate saving effect is obvious.
In terms of SPUs, the "Shan Hai" SPU IP underwent a major update at the end of last year.The new generation "Shanhai" S30FP/S30P is codenamed "White Horse".Its functional safety reaches the highest level ASIL D, aiming to provide a full-stack security solution for high-performance computing chips in the AI era.
While its four major product lines—CPU, NPU, VPU, and SPU—are closely aligned with AI iterations, Arm Technology also participated in WAIC.They spearheaded the "Open Source AIOS Alliance".Various industry players, including chip manufacturers, large-scale modelers, and university research institutes, have actively joined forces to promote the large-scale deployment of AIOS on diverse emerging smart terminals.
From hardware to software, and then to the ecosystem, Arm Technology's All in AI strategy has entered the product implementation stage.A systematic "fast track"On this road,AI is both the goal of its technological evolution and a means to restructure the chip IP value chain.
03.
From edge computing and physical networks to the cloud, AI permeates all three business areas.
Arm technology ecosystem deployed across all scenarios
If the innovative iterations of the four major product lines laid a solid foundation, the formal establishment of the three major business lines further accelerated Arm Technology's "All in AI" strategy. At the exhibition booth, we saw...Edge AI, Physical AI, Cloud AIAs its three core business lines, it has achieved many outstanding results.
Looking across the booth, from smart wearables and smart home devices to AI PCs, smartphones, smart cars, robots, and data centers,Arm technology and Arm Technology's self-developed technology IP complement each other, empowering diverse AI applications across various industries.
existEdge AIIn addition to the latest "Star" 300 platform, the solution matrix based on Arm Cortex-M CPU + Helium + Ethos NPU has covered a variety of applications such as vehicle monitoring, traffic surveillance, AI companion toys, visual tracking, gesture recognition, and industrial predictive maintenance.
Arm Lumex computing subsystem for AI smartphones, Arm Kleidi software applications, and Arm terminal computing subsystem for AI PCs are all playing key roles in their respective fields.
Based on Arm SME2 technology, the Qwen-Audio family of TTS models can run efficiently on a single Arm CPU, making local personalized multilingual voice cloning on the device a reality.
existPhysics AIArm technology is ubiquitous, spanning from IP, computing subsystems, and interconnect technologies to tools and integrated software, and from embodied intelligence to smart cars.
Whether it's humanoid robots capable of emotional interaction, or robotic arms for latte art and robotic dogs, Arm technology permeates every aspect of robots, including their central brain, interactive computing, battery management, local control, sensors, and actuators, forming a complete system support. Arm technology can be seen covering the powertrain, chassis, body, cabin, and intelligent driving systems of smart cars.
existIn the cloudWith efficiency, cost, and security becoming increasingly important, the Arm Neoverse computing platform, leveraging its superior "performance per watt," is becoming a key cornerstone of cloud computing and AI infrastructure. Statistics show that of the computing power shipped to leading hyperscale cloud service providers, [the following percentage is likely related to a specific category or figure].Nearly 50% are based on the Arm architecture.
From DPU chips, smart network cards, and SuperNIC cards to 2U, 4U, and 6U server racks, Arm-based products cover the entire chain from network acceleration to whole-machine deployment.
We have observed that Arm continues to introduce cutting-edge technologies from Arm in these three major business areas, from edge computing and physical networks to the cloud, while simultaneously cultivating local innovation.By combining self-developed IP with Arm's technological innovations, a heterogeneous computing platform is built, providing a solid computing foundation for the implementation of AI in the era of intelligent agents.
Amid the global wave of AI computing power paradigm shift, the "All in AI" strategy is bringing vitality to Arm Technology, enabling it to form a core competitive advantage based on AI.
04.
Conclusion:
A two-pronged approach: self-developed IP matrix and Arm technology ecosystem.
Solving the "computation" problem in the era of intelligent agents
Looking at the profound transformation across its four product lines and three business lines, Arm Technology...On one hand, it closely connects with Arm's global technology ecosystem; on the other hand, it cultivates its own IP product matrix.Chip solutions based on these excellent IPs have core advantages in terms of computing power density, efficiency, power consumption, and cost.
In its second year of "All in AI," Arm Technology has truly built a full-stack, all-scenario AI infrastructure foundation, supporting everything from computing platforms and systems to end-user applications. The deep integration of the Arm technology ecosystem and its self-developed IP has become a key underlying technology support for the implementation of AI across various industries. Arm Technology has completed...From "All in AI" to a complete closed loop of products fully empowering innovation in the AI era.
Facing the future of rapid changes in AI technology, more new demands and opportunities will continue to emerge. On the road to breakthrough in China's AI industry, Arm Technology has become a core enabler in the local AI chip industry.