New BRN, neuromorphic media article, page-465

https://eandt.theiet.org/content/articles/2020/11/deep-as-chips-the-new-microprocessors-powering-ai/

“The most important benchmark for AI chip performance depends on the application,” adds McCullough. “Overall, speed tends to be the critical quality but for some edge devices power efficiency is just as important. Mobile devices fall into this category when AI processing has to be implemented on the edge device itself, rather than away in the cloud.”

Established chipmakers might also find it too taxing to make a full-blown break with the past, McCullough adds. “They tend to have intellectual property back catalogues wedded to a particular programming paradigm. There comes a point where starting from scratch can produce a better solution due to a step-change in technology.”

This market re-assignment has resulted in unusual industry moves and shakes. Some of the innovative AI chip propositions have come from vendors with short track-records in the microprocessor sector – start-ups like BrainChip, Cerebras, Graphcore, and Gyrfalcon Technology – yet with the credibility to attract funding from proven technology players who are convinced by what they are buying into.