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Source: Everbright Securities Research Institute
As the largest segment of the AI chip market to undertake the strong growth of the AI chip market, the security industry is now attracting all mainstream AI chip companies around the world to frantically "pan for gold". Especially in the security surveillance market as an example, in recent years, with the improvement of clarity, the application scenarios of security video surveillance are constantly expanding, according to relevant statistics, the global network camera shipments increased from 0.79 billion units in 2017 to 143 million units in 2020, with a compound annual growth rate of 21.82%. According to IHS forecasts, webcam shipments will grow to 200 million units in 2023.
This has also become a new wave of growth opportunities for chip companies specializing in AI SoCs for many years. As the leader of the track, Ambar has produced more than 100 million chips in quantities for more than a decade, covering many application scenarios including drones, wearable cameras, virtual reality cameras, action cameras, and automobiles and security, and has been widely praised.
As the head player of AI SoC, "chasing the tide" is also an essential ability for Ampa as a navigator. As advanced processes gradually explore the 5nm or even 3nm level, AI chips need to adapt to changing market demand through rapid iteration to better balance PPA. During this year's Expo, Ambarco launched a new generation of 5nm flagship product CV5/CV52 series, this chip uses Ambarco's own CVflow architecture, in addition to using the leading 5nm process, with industry-leading 8KP60 coding capabilities, and a new generation of ISP, codec also achieved 8K level, while doing multi-channel 4K. Provide stronger empowerment for various market segments, including security and automotive.
Ambarco released the CV5 vision chip
Why did Ambarco skip 7nm straight to 5nm? Feng Yutao, General Manager of Amba China, explained: "We must be at the forefront of the process. Although the latest processes are often expensive and costly to develop, Ambarco has always been doing it with the most advanced processes at the time. The process is an important factor in achieving low power consumption, but it is not the only factor. There is also a microarchitecture, we are pursuing high performance and low power consumption in the design architecture of the chip and the process, which is why 5 nanometers are available, and we immediately put it into it. In the future, Ambarco will continue to exert efforts on 5 nanometers and launch a richer product line. "After all, innovation is the gene of Ambar as a head AI chip company, and it is also the most fundamental element of Amba to continue to lead the trend of the industry."
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"Ambar + Aoku":
"Thunder vision integration" stirs the sensor chip "jianghu"
In 2021, Amba officially acquired Aoku, a 4D imaging radar algorithm company, integrated the radar algorithm based on 4D high precision into Amba's open AI platform, and joined hands with Auco to integrate "visual perception + multiple perception sensors" into Ambarco's future chips.
In today's vision sensor market, multi-sensor fusion has become an inevitable trend, and today's various intelligent car products are the most intuitive embodiment. Whether it is millimeter wave radar, camera or lidar, the synergistic effect of various sensors is becoming more and more obvious, but due to the different manufacturers and brands of various functional sensors, the sensor chip can only be separated, and the problem of difficult adaptation also makes it difficult to integrate the multi-sensor chip, and the industry is in urgent need of integrated and integrated feasible solutions.
"Anba + Aoku", now is doing this thing, Anba China marketing vice president Xi Jianjun told Huaqiang Electronic Network reporter: "The purpose of Anba's acquisition of Auku is to make the integration of video and radar more convenient. In the future, radar and video processing and fusion can be completed in a chip, and a chip has two functions to achieve "one core and two uses". The merger of the two companies is also extremely beneficial to driving the development of the entire market. Ambarco has always been the world leader in video, and multi-sensor fusion perception is a trend in the world, and video must be integrated with millimeter wave radar and even with lidar to achieve better perception effects. If the original data is directly processed and fused in the chip, the effect will be better and the efficiency will be higher. ”
Anba's merger and acquisition of Aoku, in advance to do the chip level of the original data fusion perception layout, is also ahead of other manufacturers in the world. Xi Jianjun stressed: "With this kind of one-core dual-purpose chip, the camera that integrates lightning in the security market will become the mainstream in the future. In the automotive field, several radars commonly used now are split. With this chip, the radar can also be made into a central integrated radar in the future, the radar front-end RF is simplified, the radar back-end signal processing and video fusion can be completed in a chip of domain control, so that the number of point clouds of the radar can be greatly increased, and the point cloud pixel data can be pre-fused, and the effect is better. ”
Jianjun Xi, Vice President of Marketing of Amba China
This also means that the market will follow up to "Leishi integration", Amber priority to embark on this road to lead the trend, the future with the continuous deepening of "Leishi integration", will also further raise the entry threshold of this track, the forerunner will also set up a more solid technical barriers, the latecomers "turned away".
Xi Jianjun told reporters: "First of all, the computing power and advanced process are constantly improving. But the computing power is not enough, but also before the fusion, because the radar signal to do a lot of processing, after processing also need to fuse point clouds and pixels. Therefore, the hash rate should be very high and the pre-fusion algorithm should be very good. Let's take an example of fusion difficulty. The camera is a flat pixel, and the radar point cloud is deep information, how the radar stereoscopic point cloud is projected to the two-dimensional plane and the plane pixel one-to-one correspondence, which is very accurate, there are many advanced algorithms. And our two families are one, and the advanced algorithms of both sides are combined, and this piece can be solved very well. We have been doing radar fusion for many years, and the most difficult thing to grasp is precisely the two-dimensional and three-dimensional mapping relationship, which is equivalent to a three-dimensional space projected into the flat space, so the threshold is raised at once. ”
However, as far as the current market trend is concerned, the market pattern of various radar and visual sensors is "scattered", whether it is camera, millimeter wave radar or lidar, there are cases where the products of various manufacturers are not suitable, and once installed on the same car, it is bound to bring challenges to the design of chip integration solution providers.
In this regard, Feng Yutao said: "This is a bit similar to our traditional visible camera, when there is no millimeter wave or lidar, we also have adaptation problems." Because I am doing the back SoC, ISP inside, but the outer lens and CMOS sensor are still other, there will be adaptation problems. So, in my opinion, the adaptation of lidar and millimeter wave radar is a bit similar to this, and we can all handle it. For example, for a new sensor type, I first pick a most typical, cost-effective to adapt to my chip, and provide a program to launch the market, and then adapt according to market demand. For example, one of our solutions to use thermal imaging to warn of battery overheating is to choose a thermal imaging sensor with better domestic cost performance. "In turn, it completely solves the adaptability problem that will exist in the future of the market."
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Post-Security Era:
AI acceleration becomes a necessary "element"
"No AI, uneasy defense", it can be seen that AI has become the next trend in the current development of the global security industry. To this end, security chips have also officially transitioned from the traditional "low intelligence" to "high intelligence" to achieve the technical iteration of "AI+", and now chip companies that want to win a place in the security industry, without AI acceleration engines, it is almost impossible to survive, let alone deep ploughing the industry and changing the world.
AI intelligence, China's security market undoubtedly has the most say. Over the years, the monitoring done by traditional security is mainly to faithfully restore the scene, do not miss frames, do not drop frames and do not distort, 24×7 are all recorded and saved, in order to ensure that there is any need in the future when you can call back. In recent years, the development of cloud technology, coupled with the advent of the edge computing era, AI intelligence has become an absolute market demand.
Feng Yutao, General Manager of Anba China
Feng Yutao said: "AI will definitely find points that can bring value. From the perspective of supplying chips, Ambar hopes to empower everyone extensively. What we have developed is mainly the chip with low power consumption to run a strong AI visual processing capability. Our starting point is to believe that AI will definitely bring value. Ambarco's chips are all equipped with AI acceleration engines and are mature, and we pursue performance and power consumption. As a global company, Ambarco focuses on technology. We want to promote our technology and help our customers launch competitive products in all major markets. Ambarco attaches great importance to the domestic market, so the domestic R & D investment is very large. We have done a lot of customer support and customization for the needs of the domestic market. We will communicate with customers and the market to try our best to make products that meet the needs of the market. To put it simply, in the Chinese market, it is necessary to adapt to the local area, increase local investment in research and development, and try to make chips and solutions that meet local needs. ”
Indeed, localization is the biggest pain point for multinational enterprises to deeply cultivate the Chinese market, if this problem can be solved, it is equivalent to being able to completely open up the entire industrial chain of the Chinese market, and the competitiveness of localization services will not be weaker than the current emerging new local enterprises in China.
Anba has also always held an open and mutually beneficial and win-win attitude towards the Chinese market, Feng Yutao stressed: "We will continue to pay attention to the domestic market, supply domestic partners, and continue to achieve the ultimate in chip innovation and leadership." I think there is a possibility of cooperation with domestic semiconductor manufacturers in the future. Cooperation should find complementary and win-win points, just like Ambar and Auco. ”
In terms of localization services, Xi Jianjun added: "Ambar has always pursued technology to the sky and application to the ground. Technically, we must continue to maintain a consistent world leader. At the same time, the domestic market has a variety of endless applications, we also hope that the chip can be used in all important application scenarios, with our advanced technology to solve practical problems. We have a good R&D team in the local area to support each customer to develop their own products. As an international company, We hope to introduce the world's leading technology to serve the Chinese market and sincerely cooperate with partners in the upstream and downstream of china's industrial chain. ”
This is also the attitude that a giant company that leads the development of the global AI SoC market should have, especially in the current urgent situation, "open and win-win" is the most correct choice. As a rare "technology top of the sky, application of the ground" in the AI chip industry, with its rich accumulation in the field of AI SoC design over the years, coupled with the integration of tools and technologies in all aspects, it will surely become a "weather vane" leading China's AI chip market, and China's AI chip market will continue to iterate under the influence of Ambars to create a new "legend". (Proofreader: Marry)
*This content is the original of Huaqiang Electronic Network, and may not be reproduced or excerpted without authorization.
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