Himax Ultralow Power WE-I Plus Endpoint AI Development Board available at SparkFun to enable AI everywhere


TAINAN, Taiwan, Dec. 03, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Himax Technologies, Inc. (Nasdaq: HIMX) (“Himax”), a leading supplier and fabless manufacturer of display drivers and other semiconductor products, today announced its WE-I Plus EVB, an Endpoint AI Development Board that incorporates Himax’s ultralow power HX6537-A WE-I Plus AI processor and HM0360 always-on image sensor, is now available at SparkFun, a specialized online retail store which caters to diverse demands from developers for Endpoint AI deployment.

High performance Endpoint AI solution with ultralow power consumption
The WE-I Plus processor is designed to accommodate a wide selection of TinyML Neural Network models with programmable DSP running up to 400MHz clock and 2MB internal SRAM. WE-I Plus supports TensorFlow Lite for Microcontrollers framework and is able to run inferences such as open-source Google Examples, including “Hello World”, “Micro Speech”, “Person Detection”, and “Magic Wand”, all available at Google’s GitHub. It is fully optimized in computer vision applications and has demonstrated to be among the lowest in power consumption using the “Person Detection” example. WE-I Plus, coupled with Himax’s VGA sensor, runs the example inference and operates in power consumption as low as 2.5mW with model inference time of less than 35ms.

TinyML developer friendly Endpoint AI Development Board at SparkFun
Developers now get easy access to Himax’s leading technologies with WE-I Plus EVB available at the SparkFun online retail store for Endpoint AI system development, ultimately enabling the innovation of life-changing use cases. The all-in-one WE-I Plus EVB includes AI processor, HM0360 AoS VGA camera, 2 microphones and a 3-axis accelerometer to perform vision, voice, and vibration detection and recognition. It builds in FTDI USB-to-SPI/ I2C/ UART bridge for flash programming interfacing and message/ debug print/ metadata output. It also features two LEDs to illustrate classification results. In addition, an expansion header with I2C and GPIOs interface is offered to allow connections to external sensors or devices. Datasheets of EVB, processor and sensors are available for download on the SparkFun website.

Reference Link of Himax WE-I Plus EVB/ Endpoint AI Development Board at SparkFun
https://www.SparkFun.com/products/17256

Reference Link of open-source examples of Google TensorFlow Lite for Microcontrollers at Google GitHub

Reference Link of Himax Always-On Smart Sensing
https://www.himax.com.tw/products/intelligent-sensing/always-on-smart-sensing/

About Himax Technologies, Inc.

Himax Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: HIMX) is a fabless semiconductor solution provider dedicated to display imaging processing technologies. Himax is a worldwide market leader in display driver ICs and timing controllers used in TVs, laptops, monitors, mobile phones, tablets, digital cameras, car navigation, virtual reality (VR) devices and many other consumer electronics devices. Additionally, Himax designs and provides controllers for touch sensor displays, in-cell Touch and Display Driver Integration (TDDI) single-chip solutions, LED driver ICs, power management ICs, scaler products for monitors and projectors, tailor-made video processing IC solutions, silicon IPs and LCOS micro-displays for augmented reality (AR) devices and heads-up displays (HUD) for automotive. The Company also offers digital camera solutions, including CMOS image sensors and wafer level optics for AR devices, 3D sensing and machine vision, which are used in a wide variety of applications such as mobile phones, tablets, laptops, TVs, PC cameras, automobiles, security, medical devices and Internet of Things. Founded in 2001 and headquartered in Tainan, Taiwan, Himax currently employs around 2,000 people from three Taiwan-based offices in Tainan, Hsinchu and Taipei and country offices in China, Korea, Japan, Israel and the US. Himax has 2,915 patents granted and 551 patents pending approval worldwide as of September 30th, 2020. Himax has retained its position as the leading display imaging processing semiconductor solution provider to consumer electronics brands worldwide.

http://www.himax.com.tw

Forward Looking Statements

Factors that could cause actual events or results to differ materially include, but not limited to, general business and economic conditions and the state of the semiconductor industry; market acceptance and competitiveness of the driver and non-driver products developed by the Company; demand for end-use applications products; reliance on a small group of principal customers; the uncertainty of continued success in technological innovations; our ability to develop and protect our intellectual property; pricing pressures including declines in average selling prices; changes in customer order patterns; changes in estimated full-year effective tax rate; shortages in supply of key components; changes in environmental laws and regulations; exchange rate fluctuations; regulatory approvals for further investments in our subsidiaries; our ability to collect accounts receivable and manage inventory and other risks described from time to time in the Company's SEC filings, including those risks identified in the section entitled "Risk Factors" in its Form 20-F for the year ended December 31, 2019 filed with the SEC, as may be amended.

Company Contacts:

Eric Li, Chief IR/PR Officer
Himax Technologies, Inc.
Tel: +886-6-505-0880 Ext. 60145
Fax: +886-2-2314-0877
Email: hx_ir@himax.com.tw
www.himax.com.tw

Karen Tiao, Investor Relations
Himax Technologies, Inc.
Tel: +886-2-2370-3999 Ext. 22326
Fax: +886-2-2314-0877
Email: hx_ir@himax.com.tw
www.himax.com.tw