Intel Acquires Omnitek in UK to Double FPGA Solutions for Video and AI Applications – TechCrunch



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Intel's strategy to expand its FPGA processor business continues at a steady pace. Today, the company announced that it was acquiring Omnitek, an England based company that has developed FPGA solutions specifically designed for video and intelligence applications. artificial.

The terms of the agreement are not disclosed, but as I understand it, the price is not important to Intel. Omnitek has been in existence since 1998 and has hardly mobilized any funding. Intel will hire Omnitek's 40 employees – all based in Basingstoke, England – and the rest of Omnitek's business, which included more than 220 IP FPGA cores and associated software.

Employees and other Omnitek activities will now be part of Intel's FPGA segment, part of the Programmable Solutions Group, formed largely by Intel's acquisition of Altera for a total of 16.7 billion in 2015. The integration will be relatively straightforward: Omnitek has worked closely with Altera over the years, "said Intel vice president David Moore at the time. ;an interview.

Intel has deepened the design and production of FPGA chips because of the increased complexity and demand for power in computing. Omnitek is a logical complement in this context, while video and other applications based on artificial vision – Omnitek extends to medical devices, defense applications, security, AR, broadcasting, professional videoconferencing, etc. – continued to grow.

"Omnitek's technology is a great complement to our FPGA business," said Dan McNamara, GM's Executive Vice President, Programmable Solutions Group at Intel, in a statement. "Their deep FPGA expertise at the system level and their high performance video and vision technology make them a trusted partner for many of our largest customers. Together, we will offer advanced FPGA solutions for video deduction, vision and AI applications on Intel FPGAs, and accelerate the market launch of our existing customers while gaining new ones. "

Although the story and work of Omnitek focused primarily on video (and before that, on diffusion), a natural complement to this work was the subsequent work on infiltration inference and the necessary informatics applications that depend on it.

"From datacenters to peripherals, computer-intensive applications such as 8K video and artificial intelligence require a host of innovative compute engines," said Roger Fawcett, CEO and founder of Omnitek. "FPGA devices are playing an increasingly critical role, often complementing other processing architectures, and Intel is at the center of this revolution. Omnitek is delighted and extremely proud to bring its engineers and intellectual property to join the talented team of Intel's Programmable Solutions Group. "

Intel says the silicon market is now valued at $ 300 billion a year. Programmable solutions currently account for $ 8 billion, but are expected to growone of Intel's cloud service providers, enterprises and integrated customers, all of whom use FPGAs in video and visual applications. This agreement brings more of this activity directly to Intel.

Other acquisitions made by Intel to strengthen its PSG business include eASIC last year.

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