Samsung and Qualcomm are backing a startup that is working on chips for wearable devices that offer longer battery life.
Ineda Systems, a hardware startup, has come up with a prototype product – MIPPs-based System-on-a-Chip (SoC) platform for wearable devices with “Dhanush” branding. The company calls the platform “Wearable Processing Unit” (WPU), on the lines of GPU and CPU. Ineda’s WPUs take input from sensors on an always-on basis. This means the chip takes data from devices (wearable) and uninterruptedly update applications for users. According to Ineda, the Dhanush WPUs consume 10 times lesser power as compared to rival devices.
Dhanush WPUs are based on Ineda’s patent-pending hierarchical computing architecture that is claimed to deliver battery life for up to a month. Ineda’s Dhanush range will include four classes of WPU—Nano, Micro, Optima, and Advanced. The WPU will go into production later this year.
“The Ineda engineering team in India has developed an innovative, low-power architecture designed specifically for wearable devices. The Dhanush family of WPUs offers better power consumption by an order of magnitude than smart phone processors that are currently being retrofitted for wearable devices,” Ineda CEO Dasaradha Gude said in a statement.
“The smartphone market grew substantially with the advent of smartphone-specific dedicated application processors. Dhanush WPU SoCs will enable a similar transformation in the wearable market segment,” he added.
Pricing of the Dhanush chips aren’t out yet, but the company assures low price points that will help boost wearable market. Ineda believes the wearable chips will be shoot to popularity the same way the smartphones and tablets did. You can read more about Dhanush WPUs at the company’s official website.
“Wearable electronics and devices for the Internet of Things (IoT) are an open field for innovation, and Ineda is entering the market at the right time with a truly disruptive architecture,” a company official is quoted as saying. “Leveraging multiple Imagination IP Cores, Ineda’s Dhanush WPU brings the wearable device industry the performance and power reduction it has needed to ensure wide-scale adoption.”
The company has bagged $17 million in Series B funding from investors such as Samsung and Qualcomm. Ineda Systems has been founded by American and Indian semiconductor industry veterans, who have experience in companies such as Advanced Micro Devices, Imagination, and Globalfoundries. Outside the U.S., the company has offices in Hyderabad, India as well.
The funding is going to help Ineda further develop new range of semiconductor and software products designed for wearable devices. The chip will be used for a wide range of wearable devices such as smartwatches, health and fitness tracker. The company will be competing against the likes of Intel, Samsung and Qualcomm in this segment.
Source: PCMag