Intel has made a groundbreaking announcement about its next-generation PowerVia technology, which the company claims has put it two years ahead of its competitors. PowerVia is designed to balance performance and power efficiency, solving the problem of interconnection bottlenecks that have occurred as tasks like AI processing have become more demanding. Intel expects to launch the technology in 2024 with its leading processors, and it claims to have numerous benefits.
The technology can deliver 90% cell utilisation, which makes chip design less expensive. For the first time, chip-making is going two-sided, according to Intel. Turning the chip upside down and running power through its backside solves interconnect bottlenecks and improves performance and power efficiency, the company said.
Intel’s engineers have developed and proved the world’s first backside power solution, taking a major step to the angstrom era of chipmaking, wherein the dimensions within chips are approaching an angstrom, or one ten-billionth of a meter. The benefits of this approach include better power and signal wiring, improved power delivery, and increased performance and energy-efficiency for better results.
Intel has a long track record of introducing the industry’s latest technologies, such as strained silicon, Hi-K metal gate, and FinFET to propel Moore’s Law forward. Intel’s competitors are now working towards the ‘backside power’ approach, which enables chip designers to increase transistor density without sacrificing resources to deliver more power and performance than ever.
Intel’s PowerVia marks the company’s return to innovative and execution leadership, according to the vice president of technology Ben Sell. Intel has recently fallen behind its competitors in chip design, hence CEO Pat Gelsinger’s pledge to get the company back on track with technology for their U.S.-based factories.
