Canonical은 Hot Chips 2026에서 채택이 확대됨에 따라 엔터프라이즈 오픈소스 RISC-V의 진화상을 공개했다.

At Hot Chips 2026, Canonical presented the Evolution of Enterprise Open Source RISC-V, delivered by Gordan Markuš, Canonical’s Director of Silicon Alliances. The session detailed how Ubuntu is architected, how instruction set architecture (ISA) support is managed across diverse platforms, and what remains necessary to achieve enterprise readiness for RISC-V. Canonical’s central thesis is straightforward: an Ubuntu system must behave identically regardless of the underlying processor. This consistency is achieved by applying Ubuntu’s established packaging and maintenance model directly to RISC-V.

Ubuntu is constructed from a kernel and user space that Canonical commits to supporting for extended periods. The distribution maintains two primary package archives: the Universe archive, containing approximately 30,000 packages, and the smaller Main archive, which holds roughly 3,000 packages and offers a longer support window of up to 15 years through Ubuntu Pro. Additionally, Canonical maintains a portfolio of kernels specifically tuned for hyperscalers and silicon partners—a critical capability given that RISC-V lacks a single reference design. The overarching goal is to ensure that every new architecture flows through the same release and maintenance cycle, allowing Canonical to long-term patch and maintain released binary aggregations while delivering a unified experience.

Packages are compiled for each supported architecture, with each receiving a defined baseline representing the oldest or least capable ISA and extension set capable of running that generation of Ubuntu. Canonical provides dedicated server resources for building and distributing these packages, overseen by a core development team responsible for their upkeep. While RISC-V may appear niche, Ubuntu natively supports Arm, x86, IBM POWER, and IBM Z mainframe architectures. Current baselines include amd64 (targeting original 64-bit AMD and Intel CPUs), arm64 (utilizing an ARMv8-A baseline with VFPv4 and NEON), and riscv64, which transitioned from the RVA20 to the RVA23 profile starting with Ubuntu 25.10. Beyond static baselines, Ubuntu 25.10 introduced architecture variants, enabling packages to be built multiple times for different CPU feature sets. For example, the amd64v3 variant targets the x86-64-v3 microarchitecture level, incorporating AVX2, FMA, and BMI2 instructions while maintaining backward compatibility. Canonical intends to apply this same variant strategy to future RISC-V profiles, a move whose strategic rationale aligns with the broader context presented in the concurrent Update on RISC-V Standards and Adoption at Hot Chips 2026.

Canonical first introduced arm64 support in 2011, though it was Ubuntu 16.04 LTS that ultimately rendered Arm server CPUs viable without extensive custom patching. Moving forward, the company aims to support advanced features and platform-specific acceleration on emerging ISAs without compromising security or support service-level agreements (SLAs). To achieve this, Canonical is standardizing around RVA23, the ratified application baseline for 64-bit application processors. By mandating vector operations, hypervisor support, and bit manipulation out of the box, RVA23 is designed to deliver binary portability across heterogeneous silicon and eliminate software porting ambiguity. Both the RVA23 profile and its server platform specification have completed ratification, with server-class hardware expected from multiple vendors throughout 2026 and 2027. Canonical acknowledges that adopting a new major profile is non-trivial, requiring build system upgrades and cross-team coordination, but emphasizes that standardized profiles are essential for aligning hardware implementer and software developer roadmaps.

RISC-V package coverage is approaching parity with mainstream builds, currently reaching approximately 95 percent of the availability seen on amd64. Snap support remains under development, as most publicly available snaps continue to target the client and desktop ecosystem. Comprehensive testing reveals a more nuanced picture: across an Ubuntu 26.10 test snapshot, 3,443 packages were evaluated, with 1,898 passing for a 55.1 percent pass rate. This falls significantly short of the roughly 92 percent pass rate observed on amd64. Canonical attributes the disparity partly to reliance on emulated build and test environments, which can extend execution times from hours to days, and partly to a historically lower proportion of packages equipped with automated tests. To address these bottlenecks, Canonical is integrating native RISC-V builders in partnership with organizations supplying server-grade RVA23 platforms. Concurrently, Canonical Kubernetes and MicroCloud are being ported to enable native RISC-V container orchestration and edge cloud deployments.

Open-source collaboration remains central to accelerating RISC-V adoption. Canonical actively participates in the RISE Project alongside RISC-V International, an initiative focused on achieving commercial software readiness across mobile, consumer electronics, datacenter, and automotive sectors. The project prioritizes accelerating open-source software development, improving platform implementation quality, and harmonizing ecosystem efforts. Supporting this work, native RISC-V runners on Ubuntu 24.04 power a build and board farm hosted at Scaleway Elastic Metal, utilizing Alibaba and SpacemiT hardware. The infrastructure has processed 24,000 jobs totaling 700,000 minutes across 116 participating organizations.

Collectively, Canonical’s strategy hinges on the premise that standardized profiles and expansive upstream collaboration can bridge the software readiness gap that has traditionally delayed open-source adoption of new ISAs. By framing RVA23-style profiles as the mechanism for predictable software targeting, Canonical positions multi-architecture maturity as the foundation for enterprise-grade deployments. With server-class RVA23 hardware slated for release over the next two years, the software stack now possesses a concrete convergence target. While substantial engineering work remains, this structured approach marks a decisive step toward positioning RISC-V within the mainstream enterprise landscape.