Open source hardware is undeniably undergoing a renaissance whose origin can be traced to the establishment of RISC-V Foundation (later redubbed RISC-V International). The open ISA and ecosystem, in which Antmicro participated since the beginning as a Founding member, has sparked many open source CPU implementations, new tooling, methodologies, and trends which allow for more collaborative and software driven design.
Many of those broader open hardware activities have been finding a home in CHIPS Alliance, an open source organization we participate in as a Platinum member alongside Google, Intel, Western Digital, SiFive and others, whose goals explicitly encompass:
- creating and maintaining open source ASIC and FPGA design tools (digital and analog)
- open source core and uncore IP
- interconnects, interoperability specs and more
This is in perfect alignment with Antmicro’s mission—as we’ve been heavily involved with many of the projects inside of and related to CHIPS providing commercial support, engineering services, and assistance in practical adoption for enterprise deployments.