NVIDIA CEO Says "FGPA is Not the Right Answer" for Accelerating AI

Accelerating resource-hungry AI applications demands chip performance beyond what mere CPU or GPU can deliver, prompting researchers to turn to sophisticated Application-specific Integrated Circuits (ASIC) and Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA). Chip giant NVIDIA Founder and CEO Jensen Huang created a bit of a stir at yesterday's GPU Technology Conference in Santa Clara, USA, when he appeared to dis one of these chips' appropriateness for autonomous vehicle system development: "FPGA is not the right answer," he said. "FPGA is really for prototyping. If you want the [self-driving] car to be perfect, I would build myself an ASIC because self-driving cars deserve it," says Huang. FPGAs are logic chips best known for their programmability, which gives engineers the flexibility to configure an FPGA for example as a micro-control unit today, and use the same FPGA as an audio codec tomorrow.