Logic Fruit Technologies, a leading provider of cutting-edge FPGA-based solutions, proudly announces the release of its latest High-Speed Interface IP stack, including PCIe Gen 6 Controller IP, PCIe Gen 6 PHY IP, and CXL 3 Controller IP.

These high-performance solutions enable seamless data transfer, ensuring reliability, scalability, and efficiency for next-generation computing applications such as AI/ML, data centers, and high-performance networking.

China's domestic extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography development is far from a distant dream. The newest system, now undergoing testing at Huawei's Dongguan facility, leverages laser-induced discharge plasma (LDP) technology, representing a potentially disruptive approach to EUV light generation. The system is scheduled for trial production in Q3 2025, with mass manufacturing targeted for 2026, potentially positioning China to break ASML's technical monopoly in advanced lithography. The LDP approach employed in the Chinese system generates 13.5 nm EUV radiation by vaporizing tin between electrodes and converting it to plasma via high-voltage discharge, where electron-ion collisions produce the required wavelength. This methodology offers several technical advantages over ASML's laser-produced plasma (LPP) technique, including simplified architecture, reduced footprint, improved energy efficiency, and potentially lower production costs.

The LPP method relies on high-energy lasers and complex FPGA-based real-time control electronics to achieve the same result. While ASML has refined its LPP-based systems over decades, the inherent efficiency advantages of the LDP approach could accelerate China's catch-up timeline in this critical semiconductor manufacturing technology. When the US imposed sanctions on EUV shipments to Chinese companies, the Chinese semiconductor development was basically limited as standard deep ultraviolet (DUV) wave lithography systems utilize 248 nm (KrF) and 193 nm (ArF) wavelengths for semiconductor patterning, with 193 nm immersion technology representing the most advanced pre-EUV production technique. These longer wavelengths contrast with EUV's 13.5 nm radiation, requiring multiple patterning techniques to achieve advanced nodes.

A former Respawn Entertainment employee has revealed the recent cancellation of an "unannounced incubation project." The ex-team member's LinkedIn profile post/job-seeking alert (now removed) was widely reported on by games media outlets; leading to speculation regarding the mystery title's origins and identity. The Los Angeles, California-based company created a "new game incubation team" not too long ago—recruitment information from last year pointed to a role description that demanded: "significant professional experience designing multiplayer FPS experiences." Respawn Entertainment operates as a multi-team and multi-location development studio—with branches working on Apex Legends, Star Wars and mystery IPs. The Electronic Arts-owned firm is masterminded by Vince Zampella; a veteran developer of popular first-person shooter franchises. Based on recent official account disclosures, the EA executive is currently tasked with the challenging revival of Battlefield's fortunes.

In 2023, Zampella indicated that he was open to revisiting Respawn's long-dormant Titanfall intellectual property. The second entry in the series underperformed sales-wise when it first launched back in October 2016. Despite a fantastic critical reception and vocal support from Titanfall 2's audience, EA leadership decided to put the franchise on ice. Last March, insiders started to make speculative noise about a revival—Steve Fukuda was mentioned in leaks. His CV lists the helming of development on both Titanfall 1 and 2; as game director. The latest talk of a canceled project was soon linked back to Respawn's rumored "unannounced Titanfall IP" prototype. Respawn's website still advertises the existence of their "new game incubation team," but links lead to recruitment posts for other "active" projects. EA officially announced the shelving of the studio's "Star Wars FPS Action game" around early 2024. Respawn and EA are likely focusing on core franchises for the foreseeable future; their Star Wars Jedi: Survivor sequel seems to be a safe bet.

Bandai Namco Entertainment is commemorating PAC-MAN 's 45th Anniversary with an unprecedented year-long campaign. Featuring a host of activities and partnerships celebrating the legendary gaming icon's legacy in entertainment and popular culture, fans from around the world are invited to join in this momentous milestone. The campaign planned to run throughout 2025 and into early 2026 revolves around the theme of "imPACt" to capture how one of video games' original icons has spanned generations and is now recognized around the world as Bandai Namco's ambassador of fun and goodwill.

Born on May 22, 1980, PAC-MAN immediately gained a following as an innovative and fun classic arcade game and quickly rose to pop culture fame. With notable brand recognition around the world, the PAC-MAN brand is one of the most beloved on the planet and continues to thrive as he enters his 45th year of entertaining fans of all ages. To capture this enduring legacy, Bandai Namco Entertainment America Inc. is debuting a visually stunning trailer that takes fans on a nostalgic journey. Directed by Miles Cable of Bodega Virtual and produced by LEFT, the trailer is brought to life entirely in Unreal Engine to showcase the icon across multiple eras while reimagining his world with modern visuals and dynamic storytelling.

TSMC appears to be in for a competitive period, as sources close to Reuters note that both NVIDIA and Broadcom have tested Intel's 18A node with initial test chips. These tests are early indicators of whether Intel can successfully pivot into the contract manufacturing sector currently dominated by TSMC. Intel's 18A technology—featuring RibbonFET transistors and PowerVia backside power delivery—continues progressing through its development roadmap. The technology's performance characteristics reportedly sit between TSMC's current and next-generation nodes, creating a narrow window of competitive opportunity that Intel must capitalize on. What makes these particular tests significant is their positioning relative to actual production commitments. Chip designers typically run multiple test phases before allocating high-volume manufacturing contracts, with each progression reducing technical risk.

Reuters also reported that a six-month qualification delay for third-party IP blocks, which represents a critical vulnerability in Intel's foundry strategy, potentially undermining its ability to service smaller chip designers who rely on these standardized components. However, when this IP (PHY, controller, PCIe interface, etc.) is qualified for the 18A node, it is expected to go into many SoCs that will equal in millions of shipped chips. Additionally, the geopolitical dimensions of Intel's foundry efforts ease concerns of US-based chip designers as they gain a valuable manufacturing partner in their supply chain. Nonetheless, the 18A node is competitive with TSMC, and Intel plans only to evolve from here. Intel's current financial trajectory is the number one beneficiary if it proves good. With foundry revenues declining 60% year-over-year and profitability pushed beyond 2027, the company must demonstrate commercial viability to investors increasingly skeptical of its capital-intensive manufacturing strategy. Securing high-profile customers like NVIDIA could provide the market validation necessary to sustain continued investment in its foundry infrastructure.

Semiconductor intellectual property core provider CAST today announced a new IP core that implements the SNOW-V stream cipher algorithm to meet the security and performance demands of modern communication systems. Available now for ASICs or FPGAs, the company believes it to be the first such commercial IP core.

The new SNOW-V Stream Cipher Engine provides a flexible and reusable hardware implementation of the official SNOW-V mechanism as published in 2019 by the IACR Transactions on Symmetric Cryptology. SNOW-V revises the SNOW 3G stream cipher algorithm to help satisfy the high-speed, low-latency security requirements of 5G, 6G, and future mobile networks. The core:

Reburn, formerly known as 4A Games Ukraine, today announced its new IP, La Quimera. Featuring talent from across the award-winning Metro series, this new story driven sci-fi shooter set in a futuristic Latin America has kicked off. Wishlisting is now available on Steam. La Quimera takes place across a breathtaking Latin American megalopolis and lush jungle setting, where the player steps into the customizable exosuit of a down-on-their-luck PMC soldier battling against rival factions.

The world and narrative of La Quimera is written and created by Nicolas Winding Refn (Drive, The Neon Demon) and E.J.A. Warren. Combining Latin American folklore with highly advanced weaponry and technology, La Quimera will be playable in single-player or with up to two friends in co-op - for a total of three players. Fans of the team's past work will enjoy familiar tense gunplay and intimate storytelling combined with new game experiences through unique and highly detailed environments, characters and weapons.

VeriSilicon today announced the launch of its latest AI-based AI-NR and AI-SR series of image processing IPs, including the AINR1000 and AINR2000 for intelligent noise reduction, and the AISR1000 and AISR2000 for advanced super resolution. These series IPs provide cost-effective, highly efficient, and PPA (performance, power efficiency, area) optimized implementations with high flexibility and scalability, making them ideal for a wide range of applications, including automotive, surveillance, cloud gaming, consumer electronics, and more.

VeriSilicon's AI-NR and AI-SR series IPs leverage the company's proprietary AI pixel processing algorithms to deliver advanced image processing capabilities. The AINR1000 and AINR2000 IPs effectively suppress noise while preserving intricate details and color accuracy, delivering exceptional performance in low-light or complex lighting conditions. These IPs effectively reduce noise in both static and dynamic scenes, ensuring consistently clear and smooth visuals. The AINR1000 supports a resolution of 2560x1440 at 30 FPS, making it well-suited for low-resolution, cost-sensitive applications such as entry-level Internet Protocol Cameras (IPCs), while the AINR2000 delivers superior performance with a higher resolution of 5600x4208 at 60 FPS, catering to high-end applications such as advanced surveillance systems and sports cameras.

AheadComputing today announced it has secured $21.5M in seed funding to rapidly develop and commercialize its breakthrough microprocessor architecture designed to meet the new, unique computing demands across AI, cloud, and edge devices. The funding was led by Eclipse, with participation from Maverick Capital, Fundomo, EPIQ Capital Group, LLC, and legendary CPU architect and current Tenstorrent CEO Jim Keller, who developed cutting-edge semiconductors for Apple, AMD, Tesla, and Intel.

Today, general-purpose computing faces unprecedented challenges due to the rapid expansion of AI and machine learning workloads. A recent report found that 82% of organizations experienced performance issues with their AI workloads over the past year, primarily due to bandwidth shortages and data processing limitations. While specialized accelerators dominate headlines, they rely heavily on general-purpose processors for critical tasks before, after, and in-between AI operations. Existing architectures have struggled to keep pace with the demands of these emerging workloads, creating a bottleneck in compute performance that impacts industries ranging from cloud to edge computing. AheadComputing addresses this critical gap by providing innovative solutions designed to transform how general-purpose computing meets modern demands.

According to a well-known AMD hardware leaker, Hoang Anh Phu, AMD held a brief press conference where it confirmed that the upcoming Radeon RX 9070 XT and Radeon RX 9070 will carry a 304 Watt and 220 Watt total board power (TBP), respectively. While the post, originally on X is deleted, VideoCardz managed to read the information. AMD's TBP rating is similar to NVIDIA's total graphics power (TGP) metric, which measures both the chip and the memory and other components that the graphics card could contain under full load. So the TBP, and hence TGP, metrics are basically a rough outline of how much power the GPU will draw under full load.

AMD's upcoming Radeon RX 9070 XT and RX 9070 non-XT variants will consume 304 and 220 Watts, respectively, meaning that RDNA 4 IP will be relatively efficient. Interestingly, AMD settled on a 304-watt number instead of rounding it to 305, which usually happens. For reminder, the RX 9070 XT features 4,096 cores at 2.97 GHz boost clock, while the RX 9070 has 3,584 cores at 2.52 GHz. Both cards use a Navi 48 SKU, with 16 GB GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus running at 20 Gbps, achieving 640 GB/s bandwidth. Both utilize PCIe 5.0×16 and are rumored to be released on March 6, following their January announcement.

The more I learn about the Living Lands of Avowed, an island ripe with riches, mystery, and magic, the more it feels like it's the Wild West of Eora. A frontier full of adventurers, mercenaries, and thieves, all looking to stake a claim—as a player, that's exactly where I want to be. It projects this unique, early-modern period look and feel where it's not quite medieval, but sophisticated enough that society is utilizing things like gunpowder and blast furnaces, with cultures developing their own distinct means of survival - much like moments in the history of our world. In talking with the team at Obsidian, I learned that all of this is intentional in its design, giving us a look at what a new frontier would look like if it were a first-person fantasy role-playing game. Borrowing elements from our world also helps to inform the "rules" Obsidian follows for crafting a player experience within the Living Lands, turning the dials just enough to give us something wholly unique, where souls are real and gods exist - but not necessarily in a way that we think of them.

"When you're informed by those two basic facts, it guides a lot about both the kind of content you develop and the tone and flavor you give it," explains Game Director Carrie Patel. "The flow of souls, the presence and existence of that energy, is key and core to life continuing in Eora in a way that will resonate with players who have been through Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire. We have a traditional pantheon in the world of Pillars, and you will get glimpses of some of these gods in Avowed." This all feeds into the various cultures you will encounter along the way—what's important to them (like their gods) is what gives life to the game. The Aedyrans, for example, are a nation that heavily values the ideas of rightful rule, leadership, and order—and now they're plopped into the greatest frontier of Eora. What would it look like as they start to try and blend in with the locals? It may be a small change in their outfit or adapting to how they choose to live. This "Wild West" attracts all sorts, and rigidity may not blend very well with what's required to survive the Living Lands.

Intel's upcoming "Nova Lake" desktop processors are taking shape slowly, featuring a three-tier core design that could reach 52 total cores. Set for 2026, the flagship SKU combines 16 "Coyote Cove" P-cores with 32 "Arctic Wolf" E-cores, supplemented by 4 LPE-cores for background task management. Intel is reportedly also considering 28-core (8P + 16E + 4LPE), and 16-core (4P + 8E + 4LPE) SKUs too. The architectural design choice centers on Intel's hybrid manufacturing approach, leveraging both its internal 14A node and TSMC's 2 nm process technology. This strategic decision addresses supply chain resilience while potentially enabling higher yields for critical compute tiles. Intel's interim co-CEO Michelle Johnston Holthaus noted that Intel Foundry will need to earn Intel Product's trust with each new node, so if a node is not the best for their in-house IP, Intel will move to TSMC for production.

Initial engineering samples are already circulating among developers, according to shipping documentation from NBD, suggesting the validation phase is proceeding on schedule. Some specifications point to significant cache improvements, with documentation suggesting a 144 MB L3 cache implementation. However, the cache topology—whether unified or segmented—remains unspecified. The platform is expected to support PCIe Gen 6.0, though Intel has yet to confirm socket compatibility or memory specifications. However, we need to hold our expectations low. Previously unrealized configurations in Intel's roadmaps, like 40-core "Arrow Lake," never materialized, and instead, we got an eight-P-core version with 16 E-cores, totaling 24 cores. Final specifications may evolve as the platform progresses through development phases.

Cadence today announced that MediaTek has adopted the AI-driven Cadence Virtuoso Studio and Spectre X Simulator on the NVIDIA accelerated computing platform for its 2 nm development. As design size and complexity continue to escalate, advanced-node technology development has become increasingly challenging for SoC providers. To meet the aggressive performance and turnaround time (TAT) requirements for its 2 nm high-speed analog IP, MediaTek is leveraging Cadence's proven custom/analog design solutions, enhanced by AI, to achieve a 30% productivity gain.

"As MediaTek continues to push technology boundaries for 2 nm development, we need a trusted design solution with strong AI-powered tools to achieve our goals," said Ching San Wu, corporate vice president at MediaTek. "Closely collaborating with Cadence, we have adopted the Cadence Virtuoso Studio and Spectre X Simulator, which deliver the performance and accuracy necessary to achieve our tight design turnaround time requirements. Cadence's comprehensive automation features enhance our throughput and efficiency, enabling our designers to be 30% more productive."

GlobalFoundries (Nasdaq: GFS) (GF) today announced plans to create a new center for advanced packaging and testing of U.S.-made essential chips within its New York manufacturing facility. Supported by investments from the State of New York and the U.S. Department of Commerce, the first-of-its-kind center aims to enable semiconductors to be securely manufactured, processed, packaged and tested entirely onshore in the United States to meet the growing demand for GF's silicon photonics and other essential chips needed for critical end markets including AI, automotive, aerospace and defense, and communications.

Growth in AI is driving the adoption of silicon photonics and 3D and heterogeneously integrated (HI) chips to meet power, bandwidth and density requirements in datacenters and edge devices. Silicon photonics chips are also positioned to address power and performance needs in automotive, communications, radar, and other critical infrastructure applications.

Ultra Accelerator Link Consortium (UALink) has announced the expansion of its Board of Directors with the election of Alibaba Cloud Computing Ltd., Apple Inc., and Synopsys Inc. The new Board members will leverage their industry knowledge to advance development and industry adoption of UALink - a high-speed, scale-up interconnect for next-generation AI cluster performance.

"Alibaba Cloud believes that driving AI computing accelerator scale-up interconnection technology by defining core needs and solutions from the perspective of cloud computing and applications has significant value in building the competitiveness of intelligent computing supernodes," said Qiang Liu, VP of Alibaba Cloud, GM of Alibaba Cloud Server Infrastructure. "The UALink consortium, as a leader in the interconnect field of AI accelerators, has brought together key members from the AI infrastructure industry to work together to define interconnect protocol which is natively designed for AI accelerators, driving innovation in AI infrastructure. This will strongly promote the innovation of AI infrastructure and improve the execution efficiency of AI workloads, contributing to the establishment of an open and innovative industry ecosystem."

Halo 5: Guardians has remained exclusive to Microsoft Xbox gaming systems since launching back in October 2015, during the Xbox One era—an approaching ten-year anniversary has fans wishing for a possible port over to PC platforms. Hopes were elevated late last week due to an intriguing image popping up on Lenovo's Legion Go S product page. A certain promo image depicts screen content featuring a Steam menu session with an entry for Halo 5. This discovery (courtesy of Rebs Gaming) prompted much online chatter about the possible PC port being unveiled at the next Xbox Developer_Direct—scheduled for broadcast on January 23.

343 Industries (now Halo Studios) has ported five titles over to PC—neatly compiled in the form of Halo: Master Chief Collection—but the absence of Guardians has been a lingering sore spot. Over the past weekend, Lenovo senior community manager—Ben Green—dampened expectations. In a curt response to a query (on social media) regarding the alleged leak, he shot down the notion that Lenovo had inadvertently leaked the existence of a Halo 5: Guardians PC port. It is possible that Lenovo's marketing department had mocked-up the image in error. Microsoft's gaming division has committed to spreading its most visible IPs to "rival" platforms, so the upcoming Xbox Developer_Direct could harbor a surprise or two.

JEDEC Solid State Technology Association, the global leader in the development of standards for the microelectronics industry, today announced the publication of JESD220G: Universal Flash Storage 4.1. In addition, an update to the complementary JESD223F UFS Host Controller Interface (UFSHCI) version 4.1 standard has also been published. Developed for mobile applications and computing systems requiring high performance with low power consumption, UFS 4.1 offers faster data access and improved performance over the earlier version of the standard while maintaining hardware compatibility to UFS 4.0. Both standards are available for download from the JEDEC website.

"JEDEC members are continually innovating to shape the standards that will drive the next generation of mobile devices and advanced applications, and the committee's dedication to ongoing improvements to the UFS series is paving the way for future innovation," said Mian Quddus, Chairman of the JEDEC Board of Directors and the JC-64 Committee for Embedded Memory Storage and Removable Memory Cards.

According to a recent investigative report, UK-based Imagination Technologies faces allegations of transferring sensitive GPU intellectual property to Chinese companies with potential military connections. The UK-China Transparency organization claims that following its 2020 acquisition by China-controlled investment firm Canyon Bridge, Imagination provided complete access to its GPU IP to Chinese entities with military connections. The report suggests this included sharing detailed architectural documentation typically reserved for premier clients like Apple. At the center of the controversy are Chinese firms Moore Threads and Biren Technology, which have emerged as significant players in China's AI and GPU sectors. The report indicates Moore Threads maintains connections with military GPU suppliers, while Biren Technology has received partial Russian investment.

The organization argues that Canyon Bridge, which has ties to the state-owned China Reform enterprise, helped these technological transfers to benefit China's military-industrial complex. Imagination Technologies has defended its actions, maintaining that all licensing agreements comply with industry standards. The allegations have sparked renewed debate about foreign ownership of strategic technology assets and the effectiveness of current export controls. When Canyon Bridge acquired Imagination in 2020, security experts raised concerns about potential military applications of the firm's technology. UKCT plans to release additional findings, including information from legal disputes involving Imagination's previous management. Rising concerns over technology transfers have prompted governments to reassess export controls and corporate oversight in the semiconductor industry, as nations struggle to balance international commerce with national security priorities. We are yet to see official government response to this situation.

Despite having a rather successful launch, Hi-Fi Rush was slated to be cancelled when Tango Gameworks, the studio behind the unorthodox rhythm game, was to be shut down by Microsoft in mid 2024. Shortly after that unfortunate turn of events, Tango was acquired by Krafton, the publisher behind PUBG, and Hi-Fi Rush was given a second wind. That acquisition also got fans hopeful for a sequel, and there were even rumors floating around that a sequel was in the works. Now, in a recent interview with IGN, a few Tango Gameworks and Hi-Fi Rush higher-ups—Hi-Fi Rush director, John Johanas, studio head and creative director, Colin Mack, and Hi-Fi Rush project manager, Kazuaki Egashira—confirmed that this is not necessarily the case.

While a sequel had been in development when Krafton acquired the studio, Mack says that they "are not yet at the stage where we can say specifically." That said, the studio is apparently strongly leaning towards a sequel. The justification for not yet committing to Hi-Fi Rush 2 is that the team has a fondness for the game, its characters, and its world, so they want to make a sequel that is respectful and cherishes the IP. The team also acknowledges that "it is important to try new things," and Johanas admits that Tango is considering multiple opportunities. Throughout the interview, there's an emphasis on keeping things fresh, with the team seemingly under the impression that revisiting Hi-Fi Rush in a sequel without changing it, it would become outdated. Whatever comes out of the Hi-Fi Rush universe, it's apparent that the developers working on it don't see a sequel as a cash cow. For fans of the game, there is at least hope, since Mack says that the studio hopes to hire around 50 new employees in January 2025, doubling its workforce and supposedly allowing for more freedom for creativity and experimentation.

VeriSilicon today announced the launch of its latest Vitality architecture Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) IP series, designed to deliver high-performance computing across a wide range of applications, including cloud gaming, AI PC, and both discrete and integrated graphics cards.

VeriSilicon's new generation Vitality GPU architecture delivers exceptional advancements in computational performance with scalability. It incorporates advanced features such as a configurable Tensor Core AI accelerator and a 32 MB to 64 MB Level 3 (L3) cache, offering both powerful processing power and superior energy efficiency. Additionally, the Vitality architecture supports up to 128 channels of cloud gaming per core, addressing the needs of high concurrency and high image quality cloud-based entertainment, while enabling large-scale desktop gaming and applications on Windows systems. With robust support for Microsoft DirectX 12 APIs and AI acceleration libraries, this architecture is ideally suited for a wide range of performance-intensive applications and complex computing workloads.

A high-stakes trial between technology giants Arm and Qualcomm has revealed deeper tensions in the semiconductor industry, as Arm seeks the destruction of chip designs from Qualcomm's $1.4 billion Nuvia acquisition. The case, being heard in Delaware federal court, centers on a licensing dispute that could impact the future of AI-powered Windows PCs. Arm CEO Rene Haas took the stand Monday, adding allegations that Qualcomm violated licensing agreements following its 2021 acquisition of chip startup Nuvia. The issue is whether Qualcomm should pay Nuvia's higher royalty rates for using Arm's intellectual property rather than its own lower rates. Internal documents revealed Nuvia's rates were "many multiples" higher than Qualcomm's, with the acquisition potentially reducing Arm's revenue by $50 million.

During cross-examination, Qualcomm's legal team challenged Arm's motives, suggesting the dispute is part of a broader strategy to confront a customer increasingly viewed as a competitor. When presented with documents outlining potential plans for Arm to design its own chips, Haas downplayed these ambitions, emphasizing that Arm has never entered chip manufacturing. Allegedly, Arm sent letters to Qualcomm's customers, including Samsung, warning about possible disruption if Nuvia's IP design before acquisition in 2021 must be destroyed. Haas defended these communications, citing frequent inquiries from industry partners.

Itch.io, the popular developer-friendly indie game marketplace, has revealed that the site has been taken down by a seemingly erroneous IP protection request by none other than Funko Pop, the pop culture collectible maker. According to Itch.io, the bizarre take-down happened as a result of Funko's automated IP protection provider, and it happened despite Itch.io taking action to prevent the take-down. The site has since been restored, with the offending page removed, but it took more than a little effort on the part of Itch.io's management. The whole situation seems to have been caused by poor communication on the part of Itch.io's domain registrar, Iwantmyname, since that's where the decision to remove the entire site, instead of just the offending page, seems to have originated.

According to posts on X by BrandShield, Funko's IP protection partner, the company's automated system flagged an apparent phishing attempt by an Itch.io subdomain, prompting BrandShield to request the removal of the offending subdomain, notifying both Itch.io and Iwantmyname. Itch.io says that it then removed the offending page and sent an e-mail confirming that it had taken the requisite action, but that e-mail apparently went unread, leaving Itch.io without a site for what appears to be around eight hours. Eventually, someone at Iwantmyname was able to address Itch.io's communications regarding the take-down, and the site was restored in the morning of Monday, December 9.

We have already confirmed that Intel is continuing the development of Arc gaming GPUs beyond the current Xe2 "Battlemage" series, with the new Xe3 "Celestial" architecture in the works. However, thanks to PCWorld's The Full Nerd podcast, Tom Petersen of Intel confirmed that the Xe3 IP has been finished, and the hardware teams are already working on the next Xe4 "Druid" GPU IP. "Our architects are way ahead of us, and they are already working on not the next thing but the next thing after the next thing," said Petersen, adding: "The way I would like to comment is our IP that's kind of called Xe3, which is the one after Xe2, that's pretty much baked, right. And so the software teams have a lot of work to do on Xe3. The hardware teams are off on the next thing, right. That's our cadence, that we need to keep going."

The base IP of next-generation Xe3 "Celestial" GPUs is done. That means the basic media engines, Xe cores, XMX matrix engines, ray tracing engines, and other parts of the gaming GPU are already designed and most likely awaiting trial fabrication. The software to support this Xe3 is also being developed while Intel's team is working on enabling more optimizations for the Xe2 "Battlemage" architecture, which we previewed recently. We assume that Intel's Xe GPU will now follow a stricter cadence of releases, with SKUs getting updated much faster, given that a lot is prepared for the future.

With the latest industry boom in AI, the demand for more compute power is greater than ever, and the recent industry forecast predicts that the global GPU market will exceed $98.5 billion in value by the year 2024. This staggering projection, outlined in the 2024 supply-side GPU market summary report by Jon Peddie Research (JPR), shows how far the GPU market has come. Once primarily associated with powering consumer gaming rigs with AMD or NVIDIA inside, GPUs have become a key part of our modern tech stack, worth almost $100 billion in 2024 alone. Nowadays, GPUs are found in many products, from smartphones and vehicles to internet-connected devices and data centers.

"Graphics processor units (GPUs) have become ubiquitous and can be found in almost every industrial, scientific, commercial, and consumer product made today," said Dr. Jon Peddie, founder of JPR. "Some market segments, like AI, have grabbed headlines because of their rapid growth and high average selling price (ASP), but they are low-volume compared to other market segments." The report also shows the wide range of companies that are actively participating in the GPU marketplace, including industry giants like AMD, NVIDIA, and Intel, as well as smaller players from China like Loongson Zhongke, Siroyw, and Lingjiu Micro. Besides the discrete GPU solutions, the GPU IP market is very competitive, and millions of chips are shipped with GPU IP every year. Some revenue estimates of Chinese companies are not public, but JPR is measuring it from the supply chain side, so these estimates are pretty plausible.

According to DigiTimes, NVIDIA is reportedly targeting the high-end segment for its first consumer CPU attempt. Slated to arrive in 2025, NVIDIA is partnering with MediaTek to break into the AI PC market, currently being popularized by Qualcomm, Intel, and AMD. With Microsoft and Qualcomm laying the foundation for Windows-on-Arm (WoA) development, NVIDIA plans to join and leverage its massive ecosystem of partners to design and deliver regular applications and games for its Arm-based processors. At the same time, NVIDIA is also scheduled to launch "Blackwell" GPUs for consumers, which could end up in these AI PCs with an Arm CPU at its core.

NVIDIA's partner, MediaTek, has recently launched a big core SoC for mobile called Dimensity 9400. NVIDIA could use something like that as a base for its SoC and add its Blackwell IP to the mix. This would be similar to what Apple is doing with its Apple Silicon and the recent M4 Max chip, which is apparently the fastest CPU in single-threaded and multithreaded workloads, as per recent Geekbench recordings. For NVIDIA, the company already has a team of CPU designers that delivered its Grace CPU to enterprise/server customers. Using off-the-shelf Arm Neoverse IP, the company's customers are acquiring systems with Grace CPUs as fast as they are produced. This puts a lot of hope into NVIDIA's upcoming AI PC, which could offer a selling point no other WoA device currently provides, and that is tried and tested gaming-grade GPU with AI accelerators.