Microsoft Unveils Silicon Chips Meant to Power its AI Models, Offering Two Processors

Isaiah Richard, Tech Times 15 November 2023, 08:11 pm

The Microsoft Artificial Intelligence (AI) venture is getting a significant helping hand from its custom-made chips, and these two processors which it unveiled will soon deliver a new power for the company. Silicon is now a significant chip focus for various companies, with Microsoft joining in the trend, especially amidst the GPU shortages the world has seen these past months.

Azure's cloud computing service will see new workhorses to answer its need to process AI developments, soon to deliver its products powered by the tech.

Microsoft Unveils Silicon Chips Meant to Power its AI

(Photo : Microsoft)

The Microsoft Ignite event ushered in a new era for the company's future AI developments, with the company announcing earlier today that it is taking on Silicon chip development to supply its needs. The company's goal is to accelerate in-house AI workloads via the Azure cloud service, and this introduces the processors meant to achieve it.

Enter Microsoft's Azure Maia 100 AI Accelerator and the Azure Cobalt 100 CPU.

Both chips were designed to be silicons, with the Maia manufactured on TSMC's 5nm chip platform, with 105 billion transistors, meant to run LLMs like GPT 3.5, GPT 4, and more.

On the other hand, the Azure Cobalt 100 CPU is an ARM-based chip that will focus on conventional processes like powering Microsoft Teams.

It was revealed by the company that these chips will remain exclusive to their needs, with Microsoft being the sole user of it for Azure's AI.

New Chips to Answer GPU Shortage Problems

There is an ongoing GPU and chip shortage that the tech industry is facing, and this has resulted in NVIDIA's AI chip seeing massive demand, also it increase in prices. Microsoft takes a page from rival tech companies who are also focusing on new chip developments meant for its AI, with the company's development fitting existing machines.

Microsoft's AI Developments

In the past months of 2023, there has been one massive development from Microsoft which took over the world, and this is with its artificial intelligence which was seen throughout the year. The main focus of Microsoft regarding AI now centers on delivering new capabilities for its software and technology, particularly with its Windows seeing significant integration for Copilot.

The first Microsoft product to get its massive AI integration from OpenAI was Bing, with the company's search engine centering on the chatbot offering a way for users to generate content.

It also grew throughout the past months, centering on the Bing Search Engine offering AI integration, particularly with the recent arrival of DALL-E 3 to the service.

There are still many problems that AI development faces, and this includes the processors needed for its continued improvement and management, seeing a shortage now. NVIDIA was a previous source for Microsoft's AI chips, but now, the company is looking to make this in-house, with the Azure Maia 100 AI Accelerator and the Azuer Cobalt 100 CPU taking its place in the industry.