Altera® Expands Agilex® 9 Direct RF-Series Portfolio with AGRW039 SoC FPGA Device - Altera® Expands Agilex® 9 Direct RF-Series Portfolio with AGRW039 SoC FPGA Device Modern radar, electronic warfare, and signal intelligence systems are being asked to process more data, support wider bandwidths, and respond faster to changing RF environments. At the same time, system designers must continue to manage size, weight, power, thermal constraints, and system complexity. To help address these challenges, Altera® is expanding the Agilex® 9 Direct RF-Series FPGA portfolio with the addition of the AGRW039, a new maximum-compute wideband device designed for demanding aerospace and defense RF applications. It is the fourth device (MCP4) in Altera’s Agilex 9 Direct RF-Series to be released, based on the DARPA MCP (multi-chip package) and DoD SHIP (SOTA Heterogeneous Integrated Packaging) programs. AGRW039 builds on the existing Agilex 9 Direct RF-Series portfolio by combining high-performance Direct RF data conversion, increased programmable logic density, more DSP resources, DDR5 and LPDDR5 memory support, and network-on-chip (NoC) data movement. More compute for RF processing and AI inference Radar, electronic warfare, and signal intelligence and testing systems increasingly need to support more capable beamforming, radar data cube processing, wideband channelization, adaptive filtering, signal classification, and real-time RF analytics. Compared with AGRW027, AGRW039 delivers approximately 45% more logic resources, 45% more DSP resources, and 43% more block RAM. This additional compute and on-chip memory capacity gives system designers more headroom to integrate advanced RF processing pipelines into a single FPGA package. The DSP blocks are configurable, allowing designers to use the same blocks either as traditional DSP resources for standard RF signal processing or as compute resources for AI inference. This flexibility helps extend Agilex 9 Direct RF-Series capabilities toward AI-enabled RF systems without forcing designers to choose a separate architecture for AI acceleration. In practical terms, AGRW039 helps extend the signal chain from the analog RF data source to quick, real-time decision making, reducing the need to move data across multiple devices before intelligence can be extracted. By bringing more of the signal chain into a single programmable device, AGRW039 can help improve SWaP, simplify board-level design, and minimize latency from RF input to AI-assisted insight. Higher memory bandwidth with DDR5 and LPDDR5 support Wideband RF systems generate large volumes of sampled data that must be moved, buffered, and stored efficiently. Memory bandwidth can become a critical design factor when multiple RF tiles are capturing data and feeding real-time processing pipelines. Many AI inference applications are memory constrained. Having access to more on-die block RAM and high-speed external DDR support will enable faster processing, with FPGA-based deterministic, low-latency functionality. AGRW039 adds support for DDR5 and LPDDR5 memory to the Agilex 9 Direct RF-Series family, helping customers move beyond DDR4-based architectures and access higher memory bandwidth for demanding capture and processing workloads. For applications such as radar, electronic warfare, and signal intelligence, this memory support can enable more capable data capture, more efficient buffering, and stronger support for high-throughput processing and storage. Faster data movement with network-on-chip architecture The AGRW039 device includes a network-on-chip, or NoC, to help accelerate data movement throughout the device. The NoC enables faster and more efficient data transfer across the FPGA for high-throughput paths from I/O to memory and between I/O banks without using FPGA fabric routing resources. For wideband RF systems, this helps move sampled data quickly between RF interfaces, memory, and processing blocks while reducing fabric congestion. This architecture gives designers a more scalable way to build real-time processing pipelines and route high-bandwidth data streams across the device, effectively enabling a higher percentage of the FPGA’s resources to be utilized. More capability in a practical package size AGRW039 is designed to deliver a significant increase in capability with a manageable package-size increase. Compared with the AGRW027, AGRW039 (MCP4) provides approximately 40% more compute per square millimeter. This balance is important for aerospace and defense systems where board area, thermal design, and SWaP targets are critical. The combination of increased logic, additional DSP resources, higher block RAM density, DDR5 and LPDDR5 support, and NoC-based data movement helps designers integrate more capability into a single Direct RF FPGA package. Built on a Made-in-USA Intel 7 process For government, aerospace, and defense customers, supply chain confidence is an increasingly important consideration. AGRW039 is built on a Made-in-USA Intel 7 fab process, extending the Agilex 9 Direct RF-Series portfolio with a maximum-compute package that aligns high-performance RF integration with U.S.-based manufacturing. For customers developing advanced radar, electronic warfare, and signal intelligence systems, this combination of performance, integration, and domestic manufacturing support can be an important part of long-term platform planning. Expanding the Agilex 9 Direct RF-Series portfolio The Agilex 9 Direct RF-Series portfolio already includes several devices that are all integrated with “Multiple Chip Package” (MCP) options for wideband and medium-band RF applications. AGRW014 provides a compact wideband option, AGRW027 increases the wideband channel count and compute capacity, and AGRM027 supports medium-band RF applications requiring high channel count and high spectral purity. AGRW039 adds a new maximum-compute wideband option to the portfolio. With two A-Tiles, two F-Tiles, 3.9 million logic elements, DDR5 and LPDDR5 memory support, increased DSP/AI resources, and NoC-enabled data movement, the AGRW039 is designed for customers building the next generation of highly integrated defense RF systems. The AGRW039 is fully compatible with designs targeting Altera’s Agilex 7 M-Series devices, helping customers preserve design investments while moving to the Agilex 9 Direct RF-Series platform. As radar, electronic warfare, and signal intelligence systems continue to demand more compute, more bandwidth, faster data movement, and higher integration, the AGRW039 device gives system designers a new option to bring wideband RF data capture, real-time signal processing, and AI-enabled analysis closer together in a single FPGA package. Read More: Press Release Learn more: Agilex 9 Direct RF-Series FPGAs and SoCs Download the updated Agilex 9 family Product Table and Product Brief