Performance Optimization

Modern software is expected to run faster, scale further, and deliver more value than ever. But real-world systems often fall short because the real bottlenecks hide deep across the stack — inside algorithms, memory hierarchies, vector units, kernel settings, NUMA topologies, or microarchitectural behaviors that most engineering teams never touch.
RISCstar specializes in uncovering these issues and eliminating them with precision. We don’t guess. We measure, analyze, and engineer. Whether you need to accelerate a critical path, reduce latency, improve throughput, or optimize for specialized hardware, we bring the expertise required to deliver meaningful, measurable performance gains.

The Challenge: Unlocking the Performance of Your Software

Performance problems rarely originate where they appear. Slow requests may stem from cache thrashing. High CPU usage could be caused by false sharing or suboptimal compiler decisions. Poor throughput might result from a NUMA imbalance or kernel scheduling behavior.

Challenges include:
  • Bottlenecks buried in multiple layers of the stack
  • Hardware-specific behaviors not visible through normal profiling
  • Complex CPU pipelines and memory subsystems
  • Vector units (NEON, SVE, RVV) left underutilized
  • Kernel parameters and I/O paths configured for the wrong workload
  • NUMA systems creating cross-domain memory penalties
Diagnosing and resolving these issues requires deep knowledge of hardware architecture, compilers, operating system internals, and low-level performance measurement. RISCstar provides precisely this expertise.

RISCstar Approach: A Systematic, Top-Down Methodology

We follow a disciplined, cross-layer methodology that starts from the system symptoms and drills progressively into the root causes.
top-down

Top-Down Performance Analysis

We begin at the macro level — system KPIs, workload behavior, and high-level bottlenecks — and trace symptoms down through threads, functions, and hardware pipelines. This ensures we focus on the optimizations that yield the highest ROI.
static-analysis

Static Analysis & Code Path Examination

Before we measure runtime behavior, we analyze source code patterns, compiler output (IR, assembly, machine code), algorithmic efficiency, memory access patterns and data structures. Static analysis helps uncover inefficiencies long before runtime tools would detect them.
runtime

Runtime Dynamic Tracing

Next, we use dynamic tracing technologies to capture detailed runtime events. Dynamic tracing reveals what the software is doing right now on the live system — crucial for diagnosing complex or intermittent issues.
compile-time

Compile-Time Instrumentation

Where needed, we instrument binaries at build time to gather precise execution counts, control-flow patterns, hot loops and timing breakdowns. This fine-grained visibility guides targeted optimization.
low-level

Low-Level Hardware & Microarchitectural Optimization

Once bottlenecks are identified, we tune at the lowest level and create transformational performance gains:
  • Vectorization using NEON, SVE, SVE2, and RVV
  • Intrinsics and hand-written assembly
  • Cache locality and prefetching optimization
  • NUMA-aware scheduling and memory placement
  • Kernel and network stack tuning
  • Accelerator offload and heterogeneous compute scheduling
benchmarking

Benchmarking & Validation

We validate performance improvements across real workloads, synthetic benchmarks, and stress scenarios — ensuring results are correct, stable, and measurable.
We use state-of-the-art tools in our methodology to diagnose and optimize software performance, including:
  • Compiler-integrated analysis (GCC, LLVM/Clang)
  • Source-level analysis (clang-tidy, cppcheck)
  • IR/binary-level analysis (LLVM MCA, GNU binutils)
  • Profilers & instrumentation (gprof, perf)
  • Dynamic tracing frameworks (eBPF/BCC, ftrace, dtrace, SystemTap, LTTNG, Perfetto)
  • System observability tools (sar, iostat, mpstat, valgrind)
  • Hardware vector extensions on Arm (NEON, SVE/SVE2) and RISC-V (RVV)
  • Cryptographic acceleration instructions (AES, SHA, SM3/SM4, custom RISC-V extensions)
We choose the right tools for the job — and often contribute upstream improvements ourselves.

Proven Results: Optimization Success Stories

multimedia-codes

Multimedia Codecs (x264/x265)

Our engineers optimized critical kernels in open-source video codecs, accelerating H.264 and H.265 workloads widely used in streaming, media, and embedded systems.
blas

BLAS Math Library (Fujitsu A64FX)

We implemented SVE-optimized Level 2 and Level 3 BLAS routines, delivering ~3.5× speedup in matrix multiplication on A64FX using 512-bit SVE.
isa

ISA-L (Intel Intelligent Storage Acceleration Library)

RISCstar optimized ReedSolomon erasure code matrix operations using SVE, enabling higher throughput in storage and data-protection workloads.
intel

Intel IPsec-MB

We accelerated the ZUC and SNOW algorithms using SIMD and multi-buffer techniques, substantially increasing cryptographic throughput for network workloads.
xxhash

xxHash

By rewriting XXH3, XXH64, and XXH32 using Arm SVE and multi-buffer technology, we achieved ~3–4× performance improvement in hashing throughput
cryptography

Cryptography (Arm)

We optimized SM3, SM4, RSA, and AES using Arm’s cryptographic extensions and SVE-based vectorization — including support for FEAT_SM3, FEAT_SM4, and FEAT_SVE_SM4.
openssl

OpenSSL 3.0 Multi-Acceleration Scheduler

We contributed to the engine responsible for intelligently routing workloads across hardware accelerators, CPU vector units, and dedicated crypto instructions.
These are just a few examples of the performance wins we’ve delivered.

Why RISCstar? 

RISCstar engineers are specialists in:
  • Linux kernel internals
  • Arm and RISC-V CPU microarchitecture
  • Vectorization (NEON, SVE, SVE2, RVV)
  • Compiler behavior and code generation
  • NUMA systems and many-core servers
  • High-performance cryptography
  • Media, and networking workloads
We combine deep theoretical understanding with hands-on expertise across the entire stack — from algorithm design to instruction-level tuning.
Where other firms stop at profiling and recommendations, RISCstar goes all the way down to assembly, microarchitecture, and kernel-level optimization. We don’t just diagnose problems — we fix them.

Get Started: Let’s Unlock Your Performance

If your application isn’t reaching its full potential — or if you’re not sure why — we can help. RISCstar provides performance assessments, optimization engagements, and long-term engineering support tailored to your workloads.
Let’s talk about accelerating your software. Contact us to schedule a consultation.

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