ASIC implementation of LSTM neural network algorithm

Abstract: LSTM neural networks have been used for speech recognition, image recognition and other artificial intelligence applications for many years. Most applications perform the LSTM algorithm and the required calculations on cloud computers. Off-line solutions include the use of FPGAs and GPUs but the most promising solutions include ASIC accelerators designed for this purpose only. This report presents an ASIC design capable of performing the multiple iterations of the LSTM algorithm on a unidirectional and without peepholes neural network architecture. The proposed design provides arithmetic level parallelism options as blocks are instantiated based on parameters. The internal structure of the design implements pipelined, parallel or serial solutions depending on which is optimal in every case. The implications concerning these decisions are discussed in detail in the report. The design process is described in detail and the evaluation of the design is also presented to measure accuracy and error of the design output.This thesis work resulted in a complete synthesizable ASIC design implementing an LSTM layer, a Fully Connected layer and a Softmax layer which can perform classification of data based on trained weight matrices and bias vectors. The design primarily uses 16-bit fixed point format with 5 integer and 11 fractional bits but increased precision representations are used in some blocks to reduce error output. Additionally, a verification environment has also been designed and is capable of performing simulations, evaluating the design output by comparing it with results produced from performing the same operations with 64-bit floating point precision on a SystemVerilog testbench and measuring the encountered error. The results concerning the accuracy and the design output error margin are presented in this thesis report. The design went through Logic and Physical synthesis and successfully resulted in a functional netlist for every tested configuration. Timing, area and power measurements on the generated netlists of various configurations of the design show consistency and are reported in this report.