Driving analog compute-in-memory cells using low power sparsity-aware digital-to-analog converters

A method, comprising:

• outputting, by a digital-to-analog converter comprising one or more binary-weighted resistances, an analog input activation based on an input activation data word;
• multiplying, by a compute-in-memory unit, the analog input activation and a multiplicand;
• summing, by a summer, an output of the compute-in-memory unit and one or more further outputs of one or more further compute-in-memory units;
• and
• converting, by an analog-to-digital converter, a yet further output of the summer to an output activation data word.

A method, comprising:

• applying an activation function to a value to generate an input activation data word;
• generating, by one or more binary-weighted resistances, an analog input activation based on the input activation data word;
• multiplying the analog input activation and a multiplicand to generate a product;
• summing the product and one or more further products to generate a summed output;
• and
• converting the summed output to an output activation data word.