362: How AI Is Transforming Chip Design and Solving the Engineering Shortage with Faraj Aalaei, Cognichip CEO

Faraj Aalaei is the Founder and CEO of Cognichip, an AI company building the world’s first Artificial Chip Intelligence (ACI) platform to design semiconductors using AI. He brings four decades of experience in communications and networking, having led two companies (Centillium and Aquantia)through IPOs. Aquantia was later acquired by Marvell, where he also held an executive role. 

Prior to that, Faraj was Co-Founder and CEO of Centillium, which went public on NASDAQ just three years after its founding, the fastest IPO ever for a semiconductor company. 

He holds an honorary Doctor of Engineering from Wentworth Institute of Technology, where he also earned his bachelor's degree in electrical engineering, along with an MSEE from the University of Massachusetts and an MBA from the University of New Hampshire.

In this conversation we discussed:

• Why chip development cycles are trailing AI applications by years and how that disconnect leads to inefficient infrastructure and higher energy costs
• How AI could help democratize chip design by enabling smaller teams outside traditional hubs to build customized, application-specific hardware
• What Faraj sees as the real barrier to innovation: the time and cost of chip development, and how Cognichip is reducing both through compute-led design
• How AI can augment, not replace, engineers by offering transparent, explainable design suggestions while keeping humans in the loop
• The coming talent shortage in semiconductor engineering and how AI might close the skills gap and unlock new opportunities for nontraditional builders
• Why every major technological shift creates more opportunity than it destroys, and how Faraj sees AI enabling people to work on more meaningful problems

Resources:

• Subscribe to the AI & The Future of Work Newsletter
• Connect with Faraj on LinkedIn
• AI fun fact article
• On How To Drive Compelling Narratives in Youtube Videos.