Speedy AI and HPC Requires Collaboration and Co-optimization

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I not too long ago attended the IEEE 74^th Digital Parts and Expertise Convention (ECTC) in Denver, Colorado. Held Could 28-31, the occasion had an attendance of two,000 registrants over 4 days. There have been 379 technical papers introduced, many with a concentrate on hybrid bonding, substrate scaling applied sciences for chiplets, and different key challenges associated to the essential position that superior packaging performs in enabling the fast-growing AI and high-performance computing (HPC) markets.

To say it bluntly, superior packaging is horny! From Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) and Intel to Google and Meta, everybody was current as a result of these are the applied sciences we have to energy the subsequent industrial revolution: AI.

In her keynote deal with, Keren Bergman of Columbia College mentioned the unprecedented development of AI functions in information facilities—rising at a price of six orders of magnitude within the final six years—and the necessity for optical interconnect applied sciences to extend power effectivity and bandwidth density. Her presentation, “Petascale Photonic Chip Connectivity for Vitality-Environment friendly AI Computing,” made a powerful case for bringing photonics into compute sockets utilizing heterogenous integration—a know-how she expects to develop into commercially out there no ahead of 2027.

Hybrid bonding was one other sizzling subject lined broadly on the convention; it’s anticipated to be the successor to microbumps in gadgets requiring high-bandwidth information transmission. Nevertheless, there are nonetheless quite a lot of challenges that should be addressed.

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Designing next-generation, superior high-density substrates was additionally a key subject at ECTC, with a lot speak about glass interposers—predicted to be the up-and-coming substrate as soon as we hit the top of conventional approaches. This was the principle focus of a really attention-grabbing panel session on substrate-scaling challenges that included Gang Duan from Intel, Kenneth Larsen from Synopsys, Kinya Ichikawa from TSMC, Harish Penmethsa from Utilized Supplies, Rozalia Beica from LQDX, Masahisa Ose from Resonac, and Yu-Po Wang from SPIL.

My takeaway was that whereas glass core substrates are an rising know-how, natural substrates nonetheless have an extended life forward. The main focus proper now needs to be on collaboration and co-optimization inside the complete ecosystem. Design for manufacturing is essential—now greater than ever—to attain the best potential efficiency of AI and HPC gadgets.

New to ECTC this yr was a startup competitors within the Plenary session on “The Way forward for the Semiconductor Trade: Rising Startups and Materials Improvements in Superior Packaging,” chaired by Rozalia Beica of LQDX and Farhang Yazdani of Broadpack. I used to be honored to be invited to the jury panel lead by Yole Group’s Jeff Perkins. It was a “Shark Tank”-like session: a number of startup corporations every gave a 10-minute pitch, adopted by a three-minute Q&A from the jury panel. Collaborating startups included:

• Victor Chiriac from World Cooling Expertise Group
• Wayne Rickard from Terecircuits
• Luc Beauvillier from Thintronics

Whereas selecting a winner was troublesome, the panel finally chosen Terecircuits. Silicon Valley-based Terecircuits is addressing the restrictions of typical pick-and-place meeting of ultra-small parts for microLED panels and systems-in-packages (SiPs). Their laser-based know-how can place a number of parts on a floor concurrently. Since 1000’s of parts could be positioned all of sudden, throughput really will increase because the geometry of the parts shrinks in dimension.

I’m trying ahead to attending the seventy fifth ECTC, which shall be held Could 27-30, 2025, on the Gaylord Texan Resort and Conference Middle in Dallas. I hope to see you there!

—Martijn Pierik is founder and chair at Kiterocket.