Since the smart city entered the networking stage, IPC SoC has become the mainstream vision chip for front-end devices, determining a series of performance metrics such as device imaging and video compression encoding. Advanced products from major domestic chip manufacturers have been successively launched, driving IPC to evolve from "being visible" to "being clear" and "being intelligible". Recently, Axera, a leading developer of AI vision chips and a provider of basic computing power platforms, has released its new-generation IPC SoC chip products AX630C and AX620Q, which have attracted wide attention for their industry-leading capabilities in high image quality, intelligent processing and analysis.

Equipped with the new-generation Smart Vision 4.0 and Smart Compute 4.0, Supporting Real-time True Black Light

Benefiting from the widespread popularization of network cameras, IPC SoC chips, as one of the major smart city management chips, are regarded as the mainstream of future development. Meanwhile, with the development of network video cameras towards high definition and intelligence, the IPC market has put forward higher requirements for SoC chips. IPC SoC chips with advantages such as high image quality, good algorithm compatibility and low power consumption are more favored by the market.

Relying on its two self-developed core technologies — Axera Smart Vision AI-ISP and Axera Smart Compute mixed-precision NPU, Axera can perform structured processing on video bitstreams to realize intelligent analysis and processing, and improve the energy efficiency of chip products. At present, Axera has achieved large-scale shipments in the smart city field.

Notably, Axera Smart Vision AI-ISP empowers key modules in the ISP Pipeline through AI, comprehensively improving imaging effects in various complex application scenarios and providing high-quality image and video materials for subsequent intelligent processing. Axera Smart Compute mixed-precision NPU reduces data movement to a certain extent, breaking through the bottlenecks of memory wall and power consumption wall, and improving the overall efficiency of the NPU. Thus, under the constraints of area and power consumption at the end and edge sides, it supports more intelligent algorithms with higher effective computing power. Axera's True Black Light technology restores images realistically through Axera Smart Vision AI-ISP, and then optimizes them through the NPU for more accurate image processing, achieving a True Black Light full-color effect beyond human vision under extremely low illumination.

The newly released AX630C and AX620Q by Axera are equipped with the new-generation Axera Smart Vision 4.0 image processing engine and the new-generation Axera Smart Compute 4.0 high-performance, low-power NPU engine, leading the industry in high image quality, intelligent processing and analysis. It is reported that Axera Smart Vision 4.0 has upgraded algorithms such as HDR, denoising, demosaic, sharpening and defogging, and is superior to the previous generation in noise processing, color restoration, motion blur and sharpness in low light, thus bringing high image quality to AX630C and AX620Q.

Among them, AX630C is an ultra-high definition intelligent SoC launched by Axera for the front-end IPC market of the smart city industry, supporting 4K@30fps real-time True Black Light; AX620Q is a high definition intelligent SoC launched by Axera for the front-end IPC market of the module and channel industry, supporting 5Mp real-time and 4K non-real-time True Black Light.

Lower Power Consumption, Higher Integration Enabling Rapid Mass Production of Customers' Products

In addition to supporting real-time True Black Light, AX630C and AX620Q also integrate a 100M Ethernet PHY, audio codec and RTC real-time clock, thus showing obvious advantages in image, computing power, performance, power consumption and integration.

Specifically, AX630C features high computing power. Its CPU adopts dual-core A53@1.2G, and with the cooperation of a 3.2T@INT8 NPU and hardened CV operator modules, it can perform real-time intelligent processing on 4K images and improve the accuracy and performance of customers' intelligent algorithm processing. Meanwhile, the new-generation NPU engine of AX630C supports mainstream Transformer networks such as ViT / DeiT / Swin / SwinV2 / DETR, which can solve the problem of algorithm accuracy decline caused by insufficient training data sets and the algorithm generalization problem in long-tail scenarios.

In terms of integration, AX630C integrates a 100M Ethernet PHY module, audio codec, RTC real-time clock module, one USB 2.0 and two SDIO 2.0 interfaces, which can effectively reduce the BOM cost of customers' products; in terms of power consumption, AX630C adopts an advanced process, with a chip power consumption of less than 1.5W in typical scenarios, and can be used for products with high requirements on the overall size and heat dissipation.

Compared with AX630C, although AX620Q reduces the NPU computing power to 2.0T@INT8, it has more advantages in integration and power consumption due to the integration of 256MB LPDDR4. In terms of integration, AX620Q supports 16MB NOR Flash at the same time, enabling customers to further reduce the layout area and overall BOM cost; in terms of power consumption, AX620Q has further optimized the overall power consumption of the product. In some typical scenarios, AX620Q can reduce the overall power consumption of SoC plus DRAM to less than 500mW, helping customers realize product applications in various low-power scenarios.

In addition, AX630C and AX620Q also provide a stable and easy-to-use SDK software development kit to support the rapid mass production of customers' products.

With the continuous maturity of technology and the continuous penetration of application scenarios, the IPC SoC market is expected to maintain rapid growth and boost the intelligent upgrading of the smart city industry. Upholding the corporate mission of "Democratizing AI for a Better Life", Axera will promote the mass production and application of AX630C and AX620Q, and continue to empower the construction of urban intelligence through continuous technological innovation and product R&D.