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Autonomous Vehicles & Hardware

Waymo Unveils Custom 5nm ASIC Chip 'Ojai' for 6th-Gen Robotaxis

By Tech Bytes Staff August 23, 2026 Source: TechCrunch

Autonomous driving pioneer **Waymo** has officially unveiled **Ojai**, a custom-designed **5nm Application-Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC)** engineered specifically to power its 6th-generation robotaxi platform. Delivering over **1,000 TOPS** of dedicated neural processing power, the chip marks Waymo's transition away from off-the-shelf GPU accelerators to custom silicon tailored for real-time sensor fusion.

Waymo Unveils Custom 5nm ASIC Chip 'Ojai' for 6th-Gen Robotaxis

Key Technical Developments

By fabricating Ojai on a advanced 5nm node, Waymo has achieved a 45% reduction in compute power consumption and thermal output while doubling frame-rate throughput for high-resolution LiDAR, radar, and camera telemetry streams.

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Industry Impact & Outlook

The introduction of custom silicon is expected to significantly reduce per-vehicle hardware BOM costs, enabling Waymo to accelerate commercial fleet deployments across metropolitan markets.