Ambiq Launches heliaCORE to Accelerate Edge AI Development on Apollo SoCs
New foundational software layer delivers optimised AI kernels, over 200 accelerated operators, and production-scale validation to simplify deployment of AI applications on resource-constrained edge devices.
Ambiq Micro, Inc. ("Ambiq®"), a technology leader in ultra-low-power semiconductor solutions for edge AI, announced heliaCORE™, the foundational software layer powering its HELIA™ Edge AI ecosystem. Built specifically for Apollo SoCs, heliaCORE provides optimized AI kernels, broad operator acceleration, and production-scale validation to help developers bring AI-enabled products to market faster on resource-constrained edge devices.
Designed for production edge AI workloads, heliaCORE accelerates not only core neural network kernels but also critical inference operations—including activations, padding, reductions, reshapes, and data movement—to improve real-world performance and efficiency while reducing the complexity of bringing AI-enabled products to market. Built on the Arm® CMSIS-NN ecosystem, heliaCORE preserves compatibility with industry-standard embedded AI development workflows.
“The future of AI will be defined by intelligent devices operating at the edge, but moving AI from experimentation to real-world deployment remains one of the industry’s biggest challenges,” said Dr. Adam Page, Head of AI at Ambiq. “heliaCORE is a foundational building block of the HELIA ecosystem, providing the software infrastructure developers need to deploy edge AI faster and with greater confidence.”
Key highlights include:
- More than 200 accelerated operators optimized for Apollo devices
- MVE and DSP acceleration across current- and previous-generation Apollo SoCs
- Validation across:
- 40+ AI models
- 53 operator types
- 247 unique operators
- 963 operator instances
This validation footprint spans approximately 12x more operator instances than MLPerf Tiny, providing broader coverage of real-world AI workloads and greater confidence in production deployment.
heliaCORE expands Ambiq's HELIA ecosystem, joining previously announced technologies, including heliaRT™ and heliaAOT™, as part of Ambiq's growing Edge AI software platform, designed to simplify the development and deployment of intelligent products on Apollo SoCs.
Available through CMake, CMSIS-Pack, Zephyr, and neuralSPOT-X integration flows, heliaCORE integrates into existing development workflows, helping teams reduce software integration effort and accelerate time to market.
