India’s design-linked incentive (DLI) scheme is yielding positive outcomes, as stated by Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, praising the country’s inaugural flagship AI system-on-chip (SOC) ‘A2000’ at 12nm technology node crafted by Thiruvananthapuram-based fabless semiconductor startup Netrasemi.
The chip has successfully undergone silicon Bringup and is now gearing up for commercial production. Netrasemi has developed India’s premier Edge AI System-on-Chip ‘NETRA A2000’ at an advanced 12 nm node, which, at a commercial scale, will empower smart vision devices for applications like surveillance, automotive, robotics, and drones, according to the minister.
Equipped with smart vision and real-time video analytics capabilities, the chip enables on-device AI for smart cameras and Edge AI platforms. Fabricated at TSMC’s 12nm advanced process node, the chip targets high-TOPS AI performance, computer vision, video streaming, secure boot, and significant IO capabilities.
Featuring Netrasemi’s in-house Neural processor (NPU), Vision cores (VPU), Image Signal Processor (ISP), Crypto-Engines, and other hardware acceleration IP cores, the chip also incorporates their patented Heterogeneous graph-stream parallel processing architecture. The design will be shared with select OEMs for joint R&D to explore further commercial applications, with commercial production expected to commence next year at TSMC, Taiwan.
“Our SoCs go beyond traditional AI/ML integration by amalgamating proprietary hardware acceleration IPs with domain-specific optimizations tailored for high-performance, real-time edge AI,” remarked Jyothis Indirabhai, Co-founder and CEO of Netrasemi. The company is presently collaborating with various leading OEMs to facilitate early sample evaluations, co-development, and advanced R&D initiatives.
The semiconductor design-linked incentive (DLI) and design infrastructure support (DIS) schemes have been instrumental in reaching this significant milestone. Netrasemi was among the initial four startups chosen for Rs 15 crore DLI support in 2023 by MeitY and has secured a total funding of Rs 125 crore to date.
