Accelerate Your Edge AI Journey with NVIDIA IGX Orin Developer Kit

Imagine you are about to embark on the mountain biking adventure of a lifetime. You have done all of the planning and training. Now, all you need is the perfect…

Imagine you are about to embark on the mountain biking adventure of a lifetime. You have done all of the planning and training. Now, all you need is the perfect bike. You need the best shocks, tires, brakes, frame, handlebars, and seat. Imagine that all of these parts would come together in one package, preassembled, saving you time and money.

NVIDIA IGX Orin offers a similar package to edge AI application developers: an optimized, all-in-one platform. NVIDIA IGX Orin is the first platform to combine industrial-grade hardware with enterprise-level software and support for edge AI management.

Diagram showing the edge computing workflow.Figure 1. Hardware and enterprise-level software workflow for secure edge AI management

Rather than spending valuable resources piecing together platforms to run or develop AI applications, NVIDIA IGX Orin enables companies to move to a software-defined model, increasing development speed and reducing cost.

Purpose-built for industrial and medical environments, NVIDIA IGX Orin empowers developers with the performance, durability, security, and safety features required for AI at the edge. 

NVIDIA IGX Orin Developer Kit

The all-in-one NVIDIA IGX Orin Developer Kit comes complete with chassis and power supply to help you start or accelerate your edge AI application development. The NVIDIA IGX Orin Developer Kit key features are detailed below.

Hardware

  • IGX Orin Module: Industrial grade and certification-ready
    • CPU: 12-core Arm 
    • GPU: NVIDIA Ampere 2,048 CUDA, 64 Tensor
    • HW Safety Extensions
    • Functional Safety Island
  • NVIDIA ConnectX-7 smart network interface card (SmartNIC) delivers 200 Gb/s of networking speed, ideal for ingesting high frame rate video
  • NVIDIA baseboard management controller (BMC) for firmware updates
  • Safety MCU
    • Works hand in hand with the Functional Safety Island (FSI) and Safety Extension Package software
    • Monitors IGX and chassis environment voltage, temperature, fan, and speed
  • Chassis, including cooling fan
  • Power supply unit
  • Accessories (various cables for connectivity)

Software

  • NVIDIA AI SDKs
    • NVIDIA Metropolis
    • NVIDIA Holoscan
  • Safety Extension Package
  • Commercial OS integration
    • Canonical, Red Hat

For more information, see the NVIDIA IGX product specifications.

Key use cases

Many leading industrial and medical companies are currently using NVIDIA IGX Orin to implement AI into their operations and solutions. Read on to learn more about some of the key use cases developed on the NVIDIA IGX platform.

Industrial safety: Preventing workplace hazards

As machine-human interactions increase, particularly in warehouse and manufacturing environments, functional safety becomes paramount. For more details, see New NVIDIA IGX Platform Helps Create Safe, Autonomous Factories of the Future.

Reactive safety, a standard regulation for autonomous machines, slows, or shuts down the robot when a safety threat or event occurs. While this may mitigate harm being done to the human involved, the downtime can be extremely costly.

In addition to supporting reactive safety functions, NVIDIA IGX Orin enables companies to build a layer of proactive safety to prevent hazardous events from occurring. Proactive safety operates like an early detection and response system through a control panel overseeing a fleet of autonomous machines. 

Proactive safety includes identifying safety concerns before an event takes place, taking appropriate measures, protecting human workers, and eliminating downtime and the associated costs. Some specific examples of proactive safety are provided below.

  • PPE detection: AI models can be trained to help monitor and detect the appropriate use of personal protective equipment (PPE). 
  • Barrier breaches: AI-enabled cameras and sensors can identify and classify objects and people to determine if there is a safety or security threat and prompt appropriate safety measures.
  • Collision detection: AI can analyze real-time video and image processing to determine if the movement of machines and humans may lead to a collision. It can then take safety actions to avoid the incident.

The combination of NVIDIA IGX Orin and NVIDIA Metropolis SDKs provides developers with the powerful platform needed to accelerate functional safety AI application development and manage fleets of autonomous machines.

Industrial automation: Faster, more accurate, and more efficient supply chains 

Inefficient supply chains coupled with labor shortages have profound negative effects on a company’s ability to fulfill demand and maintain positive customer satisfaction. The urgent need for more efficient supply chains is leading to the rapid development of AI-powered solutions. 

For instance, fulfillment centers play a critical role within a company’s supply chain. Using NVIDIA IGX Orin, NVIDIA Metropolis SDKs, and NVIDIA Omniverse can transform inefficient supply chains into future-proof, adaptable operations. AI applications can be developed to produce high-quality perception data that informs real-time decision making to improve operational effectiveness. See below for a few examples. 

  • Industrial inspection: AI models are trained to detect and classify objects and identify and remove any defective products.
  • Predictive maintenance: Through data analysis of the surrounding environment, fault detection and machine/robot performance, AI can predict when equipment might need proactive maintenance to avoid downtime.
  • Field inspection: The combination of image recognition and processing and automated reporting, makes field inspections more accurate, safe, and efficient.

By analyzing data from sensors or other sources, bottlenecks in production can be detected or even eliminated with the help of AI. 

Medical devices: Real-time processing of streaming data at the clinical edge

Medical device manufacturers are embracing new AI-powered capabilities to accelerate TTM and lower development and maintenance costs. Leveraging AI computing platforms enable medical device developers to: 

  • train medical AI models faster
  • build and fine-tune medical AI applications
  • verify and validate medical-grade applications
  • securely deploy to clinical production

Using NVIDIA IGX Orin and NVIDIA Holoscan SDK, developers can greatly accelerate the development of AI applications and AI-enabled medical devices. NVIDIA Clara Holoscan is a real-time AI computing platform running on NVIDIA IGX Orin for high-precision AI, advanced security, and proactive safety. Some early use cases for NVIDIA IGX Orin and NVIDIA Clara Holoscan are listed below.

  • Ultrasound: AI applications can improve ultrasound accuracy through improved image optimization, analysis, and interpretation. This can help better diagnose conditions such as cancerous tumors or abnormalities during pregnancy.
  • Endoscopy: AI can help improve the accuracy and speed of imaging interpretation, which reduces the workload of healthcare professionals, as well as better detect any conditions. To learn more, see AI in Endoscopy: Improving Detection Rates and Visibility with Real-Time Sensing.
  • Robotic surgery: Healthcare innovators are finding ways of using AI to help surgeons avoid complications by giving real-time visualization of critical physiological structures and functions, like blood flow, that cannot be seen with the naked eye. Other leading companies use AI to connect surgeons remotely, so they are able to collaborate and produce the best possible patient outcome. To learn more, see NVIDIA Medical Edge AI Computing Platform Selected by Top Robotic and Digital Surgery Startups.

Get started

Whether you are in the planning stages, at the starting line, or in the middle of your edge AI journey, the NVIDIA IGX Orin Developer Kit will get you there faster. Get your NVIDIA IGX Orin Developer Kit today.

Source:: NVIDIA