SiFive and Arkmicro Accelerate RISC-V Adoption in Automotive Electronics with SiFive’s Automotive IP for the High-end SoC Market

Santa Clara, Calif., Aug. 30, 2024 — Today SiFive, Inc. announced that it has licensed its SiFive Automotive RISC-V IP cores to Arkmicro Technologies (Shenzhen), accelerating the adoption of RISC-V in automotive electronics. Arkmicro is a well-established chip company in the automotive industry, with products already certified and mass-produced by numerous international automotive companies. Arkmicro will integrate SiFive Automotive solutions into Arkmicro’s high-end automotive SoC chips.

SiFive has made significant investments in the automotive market over the years and the company has a growing list of top-tier customers and leading ecosystem partners. The SiFive Automotive series has achieved ISO 26262 and ISO 21434 certification; this pre-certified IP helps to reduce customers’ development time and effort. The SiFive Automotive series includes the 32-bit E6-A processor family and the 64-bit S7-AD processor family. The E6-A series consists of the E6-AB processor, designed for real-time applications requiring ASIL B hardware safety integrity; the E6-AD processor, specifically developed for advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) and other critical safety applications; and the E6-AS processor, which supports configurable lockstep and non-lockstep modes and achieves ASIL D integrity when configured in lockstep mode. The 64-bit S7-AD processor supports key safety applications, meeting customer demands for high-performance functional safety in applications such as zone controllers and functional safety islands.

“SiFive recognized early on that the automotive market places exceptionally high demands on quality and safety. To address this, we assembled a world-class team of automotive functional safety (FuSa) experts to help our customers quickly deliver safe, reliable, and certified products,” said Pete Lewin, Senior Director of Automotive Products at SiFive. “We highly value our collaboration with Arkmicro, which possesses advanced technology in the automotive sector and has been dedicated to automotive electronics for years. Arkmicro's chip products have been successfully mass-produced and adopted by renowned automotive manufacturers globally. This partnership will contribute to the development of RISC-V in high-end automotive MCU chips.”

The collaboration between SiFive and Arkmicro will not only accelerate the progress of RISC-V in the automotive electronics domain, but also mark the beginning of a new chapter for the adoption of RISC-V in the automotive market at large. For more information about the SiFive Automotive portfolio, please visit: https://www.sifive.com/cores/automotive.

About Arkmicro

Arkmicro Technologies (Shenzhen), founded by prestigious inventors, is headquartered in Shenzhen with branches in Xian, Chengdu, and Qingdao. The company holds nearly 300 patents, and its products include chips for In-Vehicle Infotainment (IVI), digital instrument control, camera monitoring, driving data record/multi-segment display, video transmission, HUD display, navigation and positioning and ISP. With ISO26262 and AEC-Q100 certifications, Arkmicro’s products are widely used by companies such as BYD Auto,Chery Automobile, and SAIC Motor Corporation Limited.

About SiFive

As the pioneers who introduced RISC-V to the world, SiFive is transforming the future of compute by bringing the limitless potential of RISC-V to the highest performance and most data-intensive applications in the world. SiFive’s unrivaled compute platforms have enabled leading technology companies around the world to innovate, optimize and deliver the most advanced solutions of tomorrow across every market segment of chip design, including artificial intelligence, machine learning, automotive, data center, mobile, and consumer. With SiFive, the future of RISC-V has no limits.