On May 13, 2025, the “Embodied Intelligent Robots” themed innovative IC product launch, the 15th Songshan Lake China IC Innovation Summit Forum, was officially held in Dongguan Songshan Lake, hosted by Xinyuan Co., Ltd. At this forum, Sun Mingle, CTO of Beijing Xinch Semiconductor Technology Co., Ltd., introduced the high-performance edge AI SoC – D9 Max, aimed at embodied intelligent applications.
Beijing Xinch was established in 2018, focusing on providing high-performance, high-reliability automotive-grade chips, covering the intelligent cockpit and intelligent vehicle control fields, encompassing the core chip categories of future automotive electronic and electrical architectures. All series of chips from Xinch have been mass-produced, with shipments exceeding 8 million units. Xinch currently has over 200 fixed-point projects, serving more than 260 customers, covering over 90% of domestic OEMs and some international mainstream automotive companies, including SAIC, Chery, Changan, Dongfeng, FAW, Nissan, Honda, Volkswagen, and Li Auto.
As an automotive chip manufacturer, why is Xinch launching chips aimed at embodied intelligent applications?
“Xinch’s transition from the automotive field to embodied intelligence may seem like a crossover, but we believe that embodied intelligence and automotive have a very high degree of similarity. The automotive chips we produce are mainly high-performance SoCs and high-reliability MCUs, which have a very high similarity to the chip requirements of embodied intelligent robots. For example, there is a need for good CPU capabilities, including AI and real-time processing capabilities, as well as a wide variety of interfaces. In terms of reliability, the automotive field has always focused on the protection of automotive functional safety, needing to handle various working conditions, such as low-temperature and high-temperature situations (up to 125 degrees), and a very long working life of 10 years of continuous operation. Additionally, as the usage increases, issues related to quality, failure, and processing must be addressed, including the need for MCUs to have low failure rates to achieve large-scale industrialization. Therefore, when we see the rapid development of domestic embodied robots, providing high-performance MCUs based on automotive standards is very advantageous,” explained Sun Mingle.
Moreover, the functions in the automotive sector are continuously merging. Previously, there were over 100 ECUs in vehicles, which are gradually merging into five major pre-controls, moving towards centralized computing, where small regional ECUs become regional controllers. This process of functional integration will also develop in the robotics industry as usage increases, driven by cost factors and the efficiency improvements brought by ECU integration, leading to significant changes in functionality and the overall architecture, including transformations in software architecture and system architecture, making intelligent applications easier to implement through software programming.
Finally, in terms of ecology, the development of an industry is not just about a single enterprise, a single chip, or a single technology, but rather the simultaneous development of the entire ecosystem, including chips, software, operating systems, underlying operating systems, applications, middleware, and cloud services, all integrated to form an industrial ecosystem, which is a situation many people see in vehicles. Sun Mingle believes that a similar model will likely develop in the field of embodied intelligence.
In response, Xinch has launched the high-performance MCU – D9 Max, which is a high-performance SoC featuring two sets of CPU cores, including one set of 8-core Cortex-A55 CPUs and one set of 4-core Cortex-A55 CPUs, along with a computing unit formed by PCU+DPU, and a dual-core lock-step high-reliability Cortex R5 core. It supports secure boot and is equipped with a secure OS, with an embedded HSM supporting TRNG, AES, RSA, SHA, SM2/3/4/9. Additionally, it has a large capacity three-level cache and supports multi-interrupt parallel response execution functions. In terms of interfaces, it integrates a rich array of peripheral interfaces including PCIe3.0/USB3.0/Ethernet TSN/SDIO3.0/CAN FD/Octal SPI/SPI/I2C/UART&LIN.
In summary, the D9 Max has three major features: 1. Multi-core heterogeneous design, providing excellent computing performance to meet various computing needs; 2. It has very rich multimedia capabilities, including various video encoding and decoding capabilities; 3. A rich interface design. Notably, the D9 Max supports TMC time-sensitive Ethernet, which is very important in the industrial control field, including support for 12 CAN-FD interfaces.
How does the D9 MAX meet the application scenario requirements of embodied intelligence? First, it requires AI computing capabilities, and the D9 MAX not only has multi-core heterogeneous CPUs but also a GPU, 8TOPS NPU, and DSP, enabling excellent AI computing capabilities. The two sets of CPUs in the D9 MAX, where the 8-core A55 + NPU + DSP are mainly aimed at AI functions, can run common Linux and QNX systems, while the 4-core A55 + GPU + VPU can run Android systems, supporting voice recognition and application interface interaction; the D9 MAX also has three high-performance MCUs that can run motion control algorithms, including network interfaces, security monitoring, and secure operating systems for identity authentication, data integrity, and security monitoring functions.
Sun Mingle stated: “We hope to achieve what five chips could accomplish with the D9 MAX. When applications undergo explosive changes, integration will be a significant trend, and the process of integration makes software development simpler, system development easier, and costs more manageable.”
According to reports, in addition to continuously producing automotive chips, Xinch also manufactures some industrial chips, and the D9 product series is the best-performing product aimed at industrial applications. This series of chips has been widely used in many fields. Furthermore, this series of chips is designed for platform compatibility, with hardware pin-to-pin compatibility and shared software. The newly launched D9 MAX is currently the strongest product in the D9 series.
Sun Mingle emphasized: “We also pay great attention to functional safety design; the entire product line has functional safety and SLD process certification, and the performance of the entire D series meets SLD safety levels, passing relevant certifications in Germany. We previously had products that achieved system-level product certification.”
Beyond the products themselves, Sun Mingle believes that the ecosystem is the core of creating industrial value. “Our technology is limited; computing power can increase, but there are constraints under cost. However, the ecosystem brings unlimited empowerment to technology. When different ecosystems are combined, each collaboration lays a solid foundation for the next value explosion. On one hand, it brings more value to technology, and on the other hand, the ecosystem drives everything forward.”
Editor: Xinzhi News – Lang Kejian
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