DI-OCDCPro at the INFORMATIK Festival

From September 24 to 26, 2024, the computer science community came together in Wiesbaden at RheinMain University of Applied Sciences. Under the motto “Lock-in or log out? How digital sovereignty succeeds”, workshops, a supporting program and networking events took place at the annual conference of the GI - the INFORMATIK Festival. The project partners met for a kick-off workshop and a panel in the main program.

Productive kick-off

The DI-OCDCPro project partners came together for the first time in a large group at a four-hour workshop. The participants from Hochschule RheinMain, Hochschule München, Deutschen Forschungszentrum für Künstliche Intelligenz Bremen, Leibniz-Institut für innovative Mikroelektronik, Ruhr-Universität Bochum,  Gesellschaft für Informatik e.V. and the project sponsor VDI-VDE-IT exchanged views on project content and milestones in several brainstorming sessions.

In order to get more young people interested in the field of semiconductor technology, a student competition “Open Chip Design Challenge Prototype” (DI-OCDCPro) for the construction of semiconductors is to be designed, developed and carried out as a prototype test run as part of the project. The workshop therefore focused on the content of the prototype, whose competition task will be “Security by Design”. Specifics of the competition task were defined in a moderated discussion round.

Prominent placement in the main program

The GI Annual Conference 2024 focused on the topic of “Digital Sovereignty” and what computer science can do to strengthen it. The main program with keynotes and panel discussions with renowned experts therefore included the topic of open source chip design.

Under the title “Open source chip design - how can we catch up in the chip market?”, panelists Stefan Wallentowitz, Munich University of Applied Sciences, and René Scholz, Leibniz Institute for Innovative Microelectronics, discussed the topic with the audience thanks to a “hot seat” where attendees could take a seat at any time. The panel was moderated by project manager Frithjof Nagel, Gesellschaft für Informatik e.V. (German Informatics Society).

The focus was on the status quo of chip production in Germany, but also in Europe. The shortage of skilled workers was an omnipresent topic, which concerns companies and universities alike and is perceived as a major obstacle to the further development of the chip industry. Open source technologies have the potential to inspire young talent and boost competition. However, business and politics must take appropriate steps to drive the issue forward.

Open source chip design community

Another goal of the DI-OCDCPros project is to establish a strong open source chip design community. The INFORMATIK Festival therefore offered a good opportunity to network with the target groups and specialist areas from computer science, the open source communities and other disciplines for the development of integrated circuits.

Are you interested in networking or exchanging ideas with the DI-OCDCPro project? Then please get in touch with us: https://ocdcpro.de/kontakt