Intel Corp. (INTC) has announced its third-generation Xeon Phi chip — codenamed Knights Hill — that uses 10-nanometer (nm) technology for high performance computing (HPC) systems.
Knights Hill will feature a second iteration of its interconnect fabric, renamed Omni-Path. Management stated that the chip will be shipped after the Knights Landing product, introduced in 2013, and scheduled for a second-half 2015 shipment. Knights Landing is the second-generation Xeon Phi chip for HPC systems based on 14-nm technology, the first being Knights Corner which was launched in 2012 and is increasingly being adopted in supercomputers.
Though Intel has not revealed much about Knights Hill, it plans to inform customers about the product roadmap which stretches beyond Knights Landing, announced in 2013. The company expects the new chip to expand both the onboard memory pool and add more bandwidth, thereby increasing the interconnect performance between the CPU and the associated MIC (Many Integrated Cores). Management expects Knights Hill to be shipped in 2016 or even later.
Also, details on Intel’s Omni-Path fabric remain limited. Based on the 48-port switch architecture, Omni-Path will offer 100Gbps line speed and 56% lower port-to-port latency than True Scale, while maintaining compatibility with it at the application level, thereby offering users a better path. The new fabric will use Intel's Silicon Photonics optical technology and offer higher performance than the existing True Scale fabric based on infiniBand. The fabric will provide up to 33% more nodes per switch chip, reducing the number of switches required. This will simplify the system design and cut infrastructure costs at every scale. According to Intel, this will improve the scalability, reliability, power and density requirements of future HPC deployments.
To Conclude
Intel is the dominant chip provider for the HPC market and, according to it, powers 85% of all supercomputers.
The technology giant is striving to capitalize on its advanced technology to capture this growing HPC market. Intel witnessed strong growth in its HPC products in 2014, with HPC revenues witnessing double-digit growth from the last year.
According to Intersect360 Research’s newly released 2014–18 forecast, the worldwide HPC market will grow at a 4.6% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) over the next four years. We believe the new Xeon Phi chip will help increase Intel’s presence in this market.
Stocks to Consider
Currently, Intel has a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). Some well-performing stocks that are worth considering include Ambarella, Inc. (AMBA), Avago Technologies Limited (NVDA) and Texas Instruments (TXN). While Ambarella sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), Avago and Texas Instruments carry the same Zacks Rank as Intel.
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