On Monday (February 18th), Chinese crypto mining giant Bitmain Technologies Limited (“Bitmain”) announced a new next generation 7nm ASCI chip for mining cryptocurrencies that use the SHA256 algorithm for Proof of Work (PoW).
Bitmain says that its new BM1397 chip “achieves new feats in performance, chip area and energy efficiency” for SHA256 mining, and it “requires lower power and can offer an energy consumption to computing ratio as low as 30J/TH,” which is “a 28.6 percent improvement in power efficiency in comparison with Bitmain’s previous 7nm chip, the BM1391.”
Bitmain will be announcing two new Antminer models that will use the BM1397 chip—the S17 and the T17—at a future date.
It is important to note that the BM1397 is Bitmain’s second generation 7nm ASCI chip. Its first generation ASIC chip was the BM1391, which was used in the Antminer S15 and T15, which were announced on 6 November 2018 and launched on 28 November 2018. The Antminer S15 has a “high-performance mode can achieve a hash rate of 28 TH/s with a power efficiency as low as 57 J/TH,” while the Antminer T15 has a “high-performance mode sees a hash rate of 23 TH/s and a power efficiency as low as 67 J/TH.”
Last month, South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported that Bitmain was “poised to name a new chief executive to replace company co-founders Wu Jihan and Zhan Ketuan” according to “people with knowledge of the matter,” and that the “potential successor is Wang Haichao, who currently holds the position of product engineering director at the Beijing-based company, but has already taken over duties from co-chief executive Wu and Zhan in a transition period that started in December.”
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