X
Tech

Chipmaker Ampere to acquire AI startup OnSpecta

OnSpecta's deep learning expertise will help Ampere deliver a better platform for inference task processing.
Written by Stephanie Condon, Senior Writer

Chipmaker Ampere on Wednesday announced its plan to acquire OnSpecta, a startup whose software accelerates AI inference workloads in the cloud and the edge. The terms of the deal were not disclosed. 

OnSpecta, founded in 2017 and headquartered in Redwood City, Calif, has already collaborated with Ampere. The OnSpecta Deep Learning Software (DLS) has proven to accelerate Ampere-based instances running popular AI-inference workloads by 4x. 

Last year, Ampere started shipping its Altra processor, an Arm-based server chip for cloud computing and hyperscale data centers. The company launched the Altra Max 128-core server processor earlier this year. 

"The addition of deep learning expertise will enable Ampere to deliver a more robust platform for inference task processing with lower power, higher performance and better predictability than ever," Ampere founder and CEO Renee James said in a statement.

The acquisition will include an optimized model zoo with object detection, video processing and recommendation engines. 

Ampere's processors are gaining more adoption with the white-box server makers that supply hyperscale cloud providers. Foxconn Industrial Internet, Gigabyte and Inspur are server makers using Ampere processors to power servers. In addition, Microsoft Azure, Oracle Cloud, Tencent Cloud and Equinix are customers using Ampere Altra, along with players such as ByteDance and Cloudflare.

Editorial standards