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“The role of software is to ensure that the hardware performs to its full potential as demanded by customers. To achieve this, a unique integrated software ecosystem from Boss Semiconductor is necessary to weave the software industry ecosystem into one. Based on the two pillars of Boss Semiconductor's creative innovation and excellent engineering, we are strategizing to connect everyone at the center of the ecosystem related to us.”


Boss Semiconductor is a vehicle system semiconductor design company established in May 2022 by CEO Park Jae-hong. Its main products include the Eagle-N, a chiplet-based AI accelerator applicable to various physical AI fields such as advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS), in-vehicle infotainment (IVI) systems, as well as robots and drones, and the Eagle-A, an all-in-one AI system on chip (SoC).

Although it has only been three years since its establishment, it is a strategic collaboration company with global AI accelerator company Tenstorrent and has acquired ISO26262, an essential safety international standard for vehicle semiconductor design companies, to conduct business with global vehicle companies.

However, semiconductors require not only hardware but also a solid software ecosystem. No matter how well-designed the hardware is, if the software system to operate it is not properly established, it cannot perform to its full potential. Therefore, many AI semiconductor companies do not overlook the importance of software and support it to work as a team with hardware.

Boss Semiconductor's Software Lead, 'Park Won-joo CSO'

At Boss Semiconductor, Park Won-joo CSO (Chief Software Officer) is responsible for software development and ecosystem creation. Park Won-joo CSO has over 10 years of experience at Microsoft, leading the development of Windows and Internet Explorer, and has held positions such as head of the Digital Media & Communication (DMC) Research Center, Software Center, and DS (Semiconductor Business) Software Research Center at Samsung Electronics, walking the pinnacle of software development both domestically and internationally.


Since 2017, he moved to Sungkyunkwan University to work as an industry-academia professor and was preparing for a break, but CEO Park Jae-hong of Boss Semiconductor approached him. Park Won-joo CSO said, “During my time at Samsung Electronics, CEO Park Jae-hong was part of the LSI (Semiconductor Design) division, and we worked together. Although I was preparing for a break after being an industry-academia professor, CEO Park Jae-hong asked for help in the software sector, so I joined Boss Semiconductor this February.” He also mentioned that the desire to create a better foundation for future generations in Korea was a stronger motivation.

Publicly, the news of his appointment as CSO was announced in May, and six months have passed since then. He was asked to explain the goals achieved by Boss Semiconductor this year. Park Won-joo CSO said, “The market response to our main semiconductor, Eagle-N, is hot. The hardware production was completed in February and handed over to Boss Semiconductor, and since May, we have been applying and demonstrating AI models requested by major clients,” adding, “Unlike general AI accelerators that need to predict market demand years ahead to develop products, vehicle semiconductors have clear demand sources, so we can design according to the purposes desired by client companies.”


He continued, “So far, we have focused on ADAS and autonomous driving, and in May, we successfully demonstrated an end-to-end autonomous driving AI model (SSR). Recently, there have been requests for future models from demand sources. The chip itself is a neural processing unit (NPU), and we have confirmed that large language models (LLM) of 10B (10 billion parameters) scale such as Llama 8B and Qwen 8B are running. In this regard, we are currently collaborating with global OEMs and vehicle research institutions, and Park Won-joo CSO thinks that 'in the long term, we plan to respond to the entire intelligent space such as infotainment.'

“Confirmed higher performance per watt compared to competitors, room for further improvement”

Currently, the main semiconductor Eagle-N is set to enter mass production in the second half of next year, with performance enhancement through memory optimization well underway. Park Won-joo CSO said, “The Tenstorrent Tensix NPU itself is advantageous for data flow, so it can enjoy superior cost-performance (TOPS per dollar) and performance per watt (TOPS per watt) compared to competitors even with a performance of 250TOPS (250 trillion operations per second. 1TOPS is 1 trillion operations per second),” adding, “Five RISC-V cores are embedded within the NPU core. Two of these are configured exclusively for data processing, and at the application process level, models and data weights are quickly and continuously transferred to DRAM and SRAM. Optimizing the core to resolve bottlenecks is the competitiveness of Eagle-N.”


He also mentioned that performance can be further enhanced through hierarchical memory structure and data movement minimization. Park Won-joo CSO said, “In the future, the data movement path between memory and computation cores will be greatly optimized, allowing the overall system performance to be more stably enhanced,” adding, “Additionally, there is a specialized organization focused on optimizing models and improving memory access efficiency. Various technologies to maximize actual utilization performance are continuously being developed and advanced.” He also stated, “In the software configuration stage, the logic and intent designed by the hardware team must be understood and configured, so a strong collaborative organizational system is in place.”

In terms of performance per watt, he said, “Even at the current stage, it shows high computational efficiency relative to power, and performance exceeding expectations is confirmed even under conditions where the operating speed or memory environment of the product is not fully implemented,” adding, “We are confident in commercialization next year, and the final product's performance is expected to improve further. We aim to surprise everyone.”

“Team with rich SoC commercialization experience... Always overcoming challenges together”

The background of Boss Semiconductor's growth within three years of its founding lies in the capabilities of its employees. Park Won-joo CSO said, “The process of making semiconductors is the pinnacle of engineering. Chips are designed for their purpose, designed at the register transfer level (RTL), then verified by creating programmable semiconductors (FPGA) and firmware. After that, they are made into wafer chips, integrated with operating systems, and verified. Even a small mistake in the entire process can cause problems for the whole project,” he began explaining.


He continued, “It is rare for someone in the industry to have experience commercializing a system on chip. However, the team leaders and leaders at Boss Semiconductor have experienced launching chips at least three times with CEO Park Jae-hong, going through all sorts of trials and tribulations. Although our company is only in its fourth year and has just launched its first product, the background to having the capability to undertake design services lies here. The software team also thoroughly keeps pace with this and leads the business,” he explained.

To keep up with the rapid market transition in the AI industry, Boss Semiconductor has a flexible corporate culture. Park Won-joo CSO said, “The competitiveness of software ultimately lies in people. To produce creative results, one must have a flexible mindset, and if not, it harms the company's competitiveness. Authoritarian culture is something to be most wary of,” adding, “Even during meetings, we sit among employees, and there is a culture of sharing opinions regardless of rank during discussions. To prevent reports for the sake of reporting, technical consultations are received as they are from design documents.”

Cooperation with the software ecosystem and overseas market development with SBA's help

Boss Semiconductor is drawing an upward curve aiming for product launch next year. On the software side, efforts are being made to secure the ecosystem through partners, and efforts are also being made to enter overseas markets. Park Won-joo CSO said, “We are collaborating with several domestic AI software companies. Basically, it starts with jointly developing AI models requested by clients, and we are also working together to build models that are difficult to handle internally. We are also securing partners in terms of autonomous driving. Boss Semiconductor's goal is to be the center and collaborate in all aspects related to computing within automobiles.”


Additionally, to promote Boss Semiconductor more widely in overseas markets, it is participating in the Seoul Business Agency (SBA)'s super-gap open innovation promotion support program. This program is a support project to enhance the external promotion and marketing capabilities of companies through effective promotion support for super-gap selected companies. Park Won-joo CSO said, “We attended CES2025 and Auto Shanghai 2025 earlier this year, and we are making efforts to promote Boss Semiconductor by participating in the IMEC automotive chiplet forum and jointly developing the Open Chiplet Atlas (OCA) with Tenstorrent. We are pleased to have the opportunity to further publicize the strength and technological prowess of Boss Semiconductor employees with the help of SBA.”

Finally, Park Won-joo CSO stated, “As the AI market changes, the front line in the autonomous driving market has widened. The expansion potential is so vast that each company is exploring. From Boss Semiconductor's perspective, we can expand our business areas further, and a new revenue base may be established. The next two to three years will be crucial. We plan to show various opportunities as reality, not possibilities, and we are determined to succeed unconditionally. From the second half of next year, we will commercialize products, including Eagle-N, and gradually approach larger markets.”

IT Donga Reporter Nam Si-hyun (sh@itdonga.com)

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