Part 4/9:
To address these challenges, Google has decided to open-source the Coral NPU design, setting a new precedent in hardware development. Unlike traditional proprietary silicon, the Coral NPU provides a standards-based, open-source reference design aimed at enabling a domain-specific accelerator accessible to a broad community of developers and hardware manufacturers.
As Ruddlage explains, the goal is to create an easy-to-adopt standard that allows any silicon vendor to implement the Coral NPU architecture, reducing fragmentation, and simplifying development workflows. This approach also seeks to improve power efficiency and performance, aligning with the evolving demands of edge AI applications.