According to a report from the Financial Times, Facebook is looking to develop its own AI chips. The report is based on an interview with Yann LeCun, Facebook’s VP and Chief AI Scientist.
The aim for Facebook is to create chips that provide faster computing power, which is necessary for the company to achieve new breakthroughs in the AI space, particularly with digital assistants. In the interview, LeCun indicated that Facebook is developing its own custom ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit) chips to support its AI software. While the company is developing its own AI chip, it will also work with existing companies.
“Facebook has been known to build its hardware when required – build its own ASIC, for instance. If there’s any stone unturned, we’re going to work on it,” LeCun said in the interview.
While Facebook did not respond to the article or provide a comment, there is a reference from one of LeCun’s keynotes where he said that a new type of hardware would be required to support AI which “might require us (Facebook) to reinvent the way we do arithmetic in circuits”.
According to another report published by Fortune, LeCun is said to be outlining his vision for AI’s future in a new research paper which he is expected to present at the International Solid State Circuits Conference in San Francisco, California on the 25th of February.
