Panel: Are Neuromorphic Vision Technologies Ready for Commercial Use?


Date:  Wednesday, May 18 (Main Conference Day 2)

Start Time: 2:05 pm

End Time: 3:10 pm

Neuromorphic vision–vision systems inspired by biological systems–promise to save power and improve latency in a variety of edge and endpoint applications. After many years of research and development, are these technologies ready to move out of the lab and into today’s electronic systems and products? What challenges do neuromorphic vision sensors and neuromorphic computing chips face when entering a market saturated by classical and deep learning-driven computer vision systems, and how can these challenges be overcome? Are both neuromorphic sensors and neuromorphic processors required for success, and what is the right hardware for today’s systems? Are spiking neural networks required and are they ready for commercial deployment? What sort of industry ecosystem will be required to enable these technologies to become widely used?

Track

Session Speakers

  • Garrick Orchard received the Ph.D. degree from Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA, in 2012. He joined the newly formed Singapore Institute for Neurotechnology (SINAPSE), National University of Singapore, Singapore. In 2019, he joined the Neuromorphic Computing Lab, Intel Corporation, Santa Clara, CA, USA, as a Senior Researcher focusing on sensing and perception. Dr. Orchard was awarded the Temasek Research Fellowship from the Singapore Ministry of Defence in 2015.

  • Sally Ward-Foxton covers AI technology and related issues for EETimes.com and all aspects of the European semiconductor industry for EETimes Europe magazine. Sally has spent more than 15 years writing about the electronics industry from London, UK. She has written for Electronic Design, ECN, Electronic Specifier: Design, Components in Electronics, and many more. She holds a Masters' degree in Electrical and Electronic Engineering from the University of Cambridge.

  • James Marshall is co-founder and Chief Science Officer at Opteran, which he established to commercialize basic research into how the brains of honeybees and other insects generate sophisticated autonomous behavior. During a career of over 20 years in industry and academia, he has led basic research projects in animal behavior and robotics with a total value of over $10M.

  • Ryad Benosman is a Professor at the University of Pittsburgh and an Adjunct Professor at the CMU Robotics Institute. He received the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in applied mathematics and robotics from the University Pierre and Marie Curie in 1994 and 1999, respectively. He is widely recognized as a pioneer and visionary in neuromorphic event sensing and processing. Dr. Benosman’s primary research goal is to understand the algorithms and mathematics that underlie cortical computation, with the aim of creating new mathematical models and replicating them as functional neuromorphic silicon devices. Dr. Benosman runs a unique research laboratory that dramatically changes the conventional approach to engineering in this field. He records brain activities to derive new mathematical models that can be used to replicate the relevant portions of the brain in hardware. This work is seen as a new paradigm of applied neuroscience that merges several traditionally separate fields, such as mathematics, neurosciences, engineering, medicine and hardware design. Dr. Benosman’s work has led to new bioinspired models for AI techniques and sensors that are widely used in academia and industry. He has authored more than 200 peer-reviewed papers and 25 patents, which together form the basis of the field of neuromorphic processing and cognition. Another important aspect of Dr. Benosman’s research is applying these technologies for use as interfaces to the human brain. His group has developed several generations of neural implants and optogenetic stimulation devices that are currently being used in clinical trials. More recently, he has been applying his work to decoding movement intentions from motor cortical neural recordings. Dr. Benosman has launched several companies that utilize his group’s innovations. These include Pixium Vision (retina prosthetics), Prophesee (neuromorphic event-based cameras), ThinkLink (motor cortex intention decoding to restore mobility for tetraplegic patients), Gensight Biologics (optogenetics stimulation technologies to restore vision for blind patients), and AthenAI (event computation and sensor fusion).

  • Steve Teig is a visionary technologist and serial entrepreneur whose work has impacted industries ranging from software and semiconductors to biotechnology and machine learning. He has served as founder and/or CTO for multiple companies, and his contributions have been recognized with numerous awards, including an Edison Award and a World Technology Award. He is an inventor on 362 U.S. patents across multiple disciplines, and a well-regarded speaker who has delivered keynotes and invited lectures at conferences and universities around the world. He currently serves as CEO of Perceive, which provides the Ergo® edge AI processor, a purpose-built chip to enable sophisticated neural networks to run within power-constrained devices for a wide range of applications.


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Panel: Are Neuromorphic Vision Technologies Ready for Commercial Use?