Google and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) signed a cooperative research and development agreement on Wednesday. The company will pay for the manufacture of open-source chips that university and small businesses may use to develop future applications.
NIST or Google has yet to disclose the process technologies that will be used at SkyWater's 200-mm facility in Bloomington, Minnesota. However, SkyWater and Google already have an open-source 130nm process design kit (PDK) that may be used to create new open-source designs.
NIST and its university research partners* will develop 40 open-source chips suitable for many applications, and Google will finance the first manufacturing run. Academic and small business researchers will review these chips and their open-source designs. Some of those chips may be further tweaked to create ICs specific for a particular purpose, while others might be used to power other creative technologies without incurring licensing fees.
NIST's primary aim is to shorten the time it takes for innovative goods to enter the market, by allowing interested parties access to essential building blocks that will expedite product integration and prototyping. Google or other digital juggernauts may purchase the most innovative startups.
NIST does not specify the kinds of open-source chips it intends to develop. However, it does indicate that it is interested in investigating novel memory systems, nanosensors, bioelectronics, and advanced technologies required for quantum computing and artificial intelligence.
If researchers have access to chips in this form, they will be able to develop faster cutting-edge technologies and designs. The transition from the lab to the industry will be speeded.