The Raspberry Pi is a versatile single-board computer to which external sensors can be connected, and the new model of the Raspberry Pi has sufficient computing capacity for more demanding tasks. A new, official expansion module is now available, which is intended to facilitate the use of complex AI apps with low latency and low power requirements.
The HAT was developed in collaboration with Hailo and comes with a Hailo 8L computing chip, which offers a computing capacity of 13 TOPs. Technically speaking, the Raspberry Pi AI Kit is a module with space for an M.2 board in the M.2 2242 form factor, in which the corresponding NPU is installed in the form of such an M.2 board. Communication between the Raspberry Pi 5 and the board takes place via PCIe 2.0 and thus at relatively high speeds.
The installation of the expansion board does not prevent the use of external sensors and actuators on the Raspberry Pi, as the GPIO header is simply looped through. Another major advantage of the solution is its ease of use. If a current Raspberry Pi OS operating system is used, the NPU is automatically detected and can be run on the OS in question. The rpicam-apps application supports the module natively.
The Raspberry Pi AI Kit is priced at $70.