Qualcomm accelerates data center push with new AI chips launching next year

(Reuters) -Qualcomm on Monday unveiled two artificial intelligence chips for data centers, with commercial availability from next year, as it pushes to diversify beyond smartphones and expand into the fast-growing AI infrastructure market. Shares of Qualcomm surged nearly 15% on the news. The new chips, called AI200 and AI250, are designed for improved memory capacity and running AI applications, or inference, and will be available in 2026 and 2027, respectively. Global investment in AI chips has soared as cloud providers, chipmakers and enterprises rush to build infrastructure capable of supporting complex, large language models, chatbots and other generative AI tools. Nvidia chips, however, underpin much of the current AI boom. Qualcomm, to strengthen its AI portfolio, agreed to buy Alphawave in June, which designs semiconductor tech for data centers, for about $2.4 billion. In May, Qualcomm also said it would make custom data center central processing units that use technology from Nvidia to connect to the firm's artificial intelligence chips. Qualcomm said the new chips support common AI frameworks and tools, with advanced software support, and added they will lower the total cost of ownership for enterprises. The San Diego-based company also unveiled accelerator cards and racks based on the new chips. Earlier this month, peer Intel announced a new artificial intelligence chip called Crescent Island for the data center that it plans to launch next year. (Reporting by Harshita Mary Varghese in Bengaluru; Editing by Vijay Kishore)

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