Aspex Semiconductor

Aspex Semiconductor was a fabless semiconductor company that developed and licensed reconfigurable processor array technology. Founded in 2002 as a spin-out from Brunel University in the UK, the company's origins trace back to research initiated in the early 1990s by its founders. The founding team included Professor Mike Lea, Dr. Peter Ivey, and Dr. Simon Jones, who were instrumental in developing the core technology at the university.

Aspex Semiconductor's primary offering was its eXtreme Processor Platform (XPP), a highly parallel and reconfigurable processing architecture. This technology was designed for computationally intensive applications, such as digital signal processing (DSP), image processing, and software-defined radio, offering a blend of the flexibility of FPGAs and the performance of ASICs. The architecture featured a large array of simple processing elements that could be dynamically reconfigured to suit specific algorithms, enabling high-performance, low-power solutions. The company operated on an intellectual property (IP) licensing model, providing its processor designs to semiconductor manufacturers and system developers to integrate into their own chips.

Over its operational history, Aspex secured venture capital funding from investors including ACT Venture Capital and Vision Capital. The company was based in Theale, Berkshire, UK. In 2008, Aspex Semiconductor was acquired by PMC-Sierra, a provider of broadband communications and storage semiconductors. PMC-Sierra integrated Aspex's technology and team to enhance its product offerings, particularly for the wireless infrastructure market.

Keywords: reconfigurable processors, semiconductor IP, fabless, processor array, high-performance computing, digital signal processing, embedded systems, parallel processing, XPP architecture, semiconductor design