There’s a tendency to focus on leading-edge nodes. It’s understandable, but most of the interesting innovation right now is happening elsewhere, and particularly at the system level:
- Advanced packaging
- Chiplets
- Photonics
- Compound semiconductors
Where the UK fits in
This is an area where the UK is genuinely strong. Several of the newer companies I’ve come across, including recent ChipStartUK cohorts, are already building photonics into their architectures from the outset.
More broadly, it’s the startups driving much of this shift. They’re willing to rethink architectures, challenge standard approaches, and take on risks that larger organisations tend to avoid.
A system integration problem
The net effect is that AI hardware has become a system integration problem as much as a silicon one, and that shifts where the real engineering challenges sit.
Worth a read: EETimes’ piece, Six trends driving 3D IC innovations in the AI era.