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Altera, a subsidiary of Intel known for its programmable chips, has launched a series of innovative products aimed at enhancing AI capabilities at both the edge and in the cloud.
The new offerings include field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) that can be programmed even after fabrication, along with supporting software and development tools designed to broaden the accessibility of programmable solutions across various sectors and applications.
During its annual developers’ conference, Altera shared insightful details about its next-generation Agilex 3 FPGAs, which are optimized for improved power efficiency and cost-effectiveness. Additionally, the company introduced development kits and software support for the Agilex 5 FPGAs, as presented by Sandra Rivera, CEO of Altera, during a recent press briefing.
“Collaborating closely with our ecosystem and distribution partners, we at Altera are dedicated to offering FPGA-based solutions that empower innovators with state-of-the-art programmable technologies that are straightforward to design and implement,” Rivera stated. “These announcements mark a crucial step in our mission to leverage programmable logic to deliver exceptional value across diverse industries, including data centers, aerospace and defense, communications, automotive, industrial, medical, and embedded systems.”
Having been with Altera for approximately nine months, Rivera emphasized the significance of the company’s Altera Innovator’s Day, which symbolizes a strategic rebranding aimed at distinguishing the company from Intel.
“Our ambition is to become the leading FPGA provider globally, a challenging and ambitious objective,” she remarked. “We stand as the only company that addresses the entire FPGA spectrum, from cloud to edge.”
“Our daily focus is on our FPGA portfolio. It encompasses everything we do,” she added.
Importance of Altera’s Innovations
With four decades of experience and an acquisition by Intel in 2015 valued at $16.5 billion, Altera operates as a significant player, competing directly with Xilinx—another FPGA manufacturer purchased by AMD in 2020 for $35 billion. Initially integrated into Intel’s operations, Altera has recently taken steps to untangle and enhance its independence.
This restructuring enables Altera to refine its operational framework, marketing strategies, and customer support while optimizing product offerings.
“We decided early in the year to revamp our roadmap to simplify our processes and enhance our engineering efficiencies,” Rivera explained. “This approach has been well-received, signifying our commitment to making advancements in our pipeline and securing more design wins.”
With confidence, Rivera noted that Altera captures more than half of the opportunities it pursues, a key strategy in its goal to dominate the market.
Positioned as the sole independent FPGA vendor capable of delivering comprehensive solutions across computing systems, next-generation communications, and intelligent edge applications, Altera remains laser-focused on delivering premier capabilities to its users. This efficiency enables clients to implement FPGA solutions swiftly and economically, enhancing value delivery.
As the landscape of intelligent computing evolves, Altera’s expansive FPGA portfolio supports customers in navigating the rapidly changing market demands.
Targeting AI inference tasks, Altera’s Agilex FPGAs integrate AI Tensor Blocks and utilize the Altera FPGA AI Suite, streamlining FPGA development using widely adopted frameworks like TensorFlow, PyTorch, and the OpenVINO toolkit.
Features of Agilex 3 FPGAs
Highlighting the advancements of the Agilex chip line, Rivera stated, “We possess extensive portfolio coverage, performance metrics, software solutions, and critically, the AI capabilities that our customers are eager for as we strive for No. 1.”
She emphasized that these chips represent the only FPGA line featuring AI-embedded architectures.
Altera introduced its Agilex 3 FPGAs, which are tailored to meet the demands of embedded and intelligent edge applications, boasting higher integration, enhanced security, and improved performance compared to previous iterations. These FPGAs feature densities from 25,000 to 135,000 logic elements.
Equipped with an on-chip dual Cortex A55 ARM processor, the Agilex 3 FPGAs offer real-time computing capabilities crucial for high-stakes applications such as autonomous vehicles and IoT devices. In smart factory settings, these FPGAs facilitate seamless integration of sensors and machine learning techniques to enhance automation processes.
Security is a priority, with Agilex 3 FPGAs introducing essential features like bitstream encryption, authentication, and physical anti-tamper safeguards, ensuring reliable operation in critical settings.
Enhanced through Altera’s HyperFlex architecture, Agilex 3 FPGAs achieve 1.9 times the performance of their predecessors, supporting high clock frequencies while remaining cost-effective and energy-efficient. Additional capabilities include high-speed transceivers and support for LPDDR4 memory.
Software support for these devices will commence in Q1 2025, with development kits and production shipping expected by mid-2025.
Streamlining FPGA Development Processes
In conjunction with hardware advancements, Altera announced enhancements in its Quartus Prime Pro software, designed to enhance developer productivity by accelerating design and compilation processes.
The forthcoming Quartus Prime Pro 24.3 version will support more devices in the Agilex lineup and bolster capabilities for embedded applications.
Users will be able to begin designing Agilex 5 FPGA D-series devices, broadening the scope of potential applications beyond the E-series, which are optimized for edge solutions. Furthermore, Altera provides no-cost software support to help lower entry barriers for its mid-tier FPGA family.
The latest software will also cater to embedded applications featuring Altera’s RISC-V solutions and the Nios V soft-core processor, presenting customers with design examples that capitalize on advanced features such as lockstep operation and error correction.
“We are delivering software resources to our ecosystem free of charge,” Rivera stated.
Support for numerous operating systems, including Linux, VxWorks, and Zephyr, is integrated into the recent updates for the Agilex 5 SoC FPGA-based hard processor subsystem.
Altera, alongside its ecosystem partners, unveiled 11 new development kits and system-on-modules (SoMs) built around Agilex 5 FPGAs, enhancing the variety of available solutions to assist developers in initiating their projects effectively.
These FPGA development kits provide affordable and straightforward access to Altera’s innovations, enabling developers to experience the full benefits of Agilex capabilities while paving the way for efficient volume production.
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