Google launches a tiny board that runs Gemma 3 locally

['At its annual Google I/O conference, the tech giant pulled back the curtain on the Coral Board, a diminutive single-board computer designed to bring artificial intelligence to small devices such as headphones, AR glasses, and smartwatches. The brainchild of Google Research, the board boasts the Coral NPU, an open-source machine learning unit built on the RISC-V architecture. This innovative component aims to tackle the longstanding issue of fragmentation among AI accelerators, which has hindered the development of on-device AI applications.', "The Coral Board's core is powered by a Synaptics Astra SL2619 chip, which features a 2 GHz dual-core processor, 2 GB of RAM, and a computing capacity of 1 TOPS.

Notably, the board is capable of running Google's Gemma 3 270M, a slightly older open-source language model, entirely locally - without the need for cloud connectivity. This capability was showcased at I/O through a series of impressive demos, including real-time translation, voice-controlled hardware, and a generative music performance. In the latter, a YOLOv8 model tracked jellyfish movements and converted them into music in real-time.", "The demos, which are all open source and available on GitHub, highlight the Coral Board's potential to democratize access to on-device AI.

By enabling developers to build and deploy AI applications locally, Google hopes to spur innovation in areas such as edge AI, where data processing occurs on the device itself rather than in the cloud. The Coral Board is expected to ship this summer, although Google has yet to announce a price for the device.", 'The launch of the Coral Board comes as Google continues to push the boundaries of AI research and development. With its focus on open-source technology and on-device AI, the company aims to make AI more accessible and ubiquitous.

As the AI landscape continues to evolve, the Coral Board is poised to play a significant role in shaping the future of edge AI and machine learning applications.', "The Coral Board's release has significant implications for developers and the broader AI community. By providing a compact, affordable, and open-source platform for building on-device AI applications, Google is empowering developers to create innovative solutions that can run independently of the cloud. As the board prepares to hit the market this summer, it will be exciting to see the creative ways in which developers leverage its capabilities to bring AI to life in new and innovative ways."]