Well, Handshake did make an asynchronous ARM core not too long ago, and Achronix has a nice business in async FPGAs, so the idea isn't dead. That said, I'm not sure (though I'd love to be proved wrong) that the idea will really go big again. Synchronous chips are still easier to reason about.
By far the most expensive real estate on a typical processor is on-chip RAM, and that really does need a clock. Sure, clock-tree synthesis is complex enough that you may even still be able to start up a company selling a tool for it, but it's still possible for a few reasonably competent engineers to do within some weeks.
By far the most expensive real estate on a typical processor is on-chip RAM, and that really does need a clock. Sure, clock-tree synthesis is complex enough that you may even still be able to start up a company selling a tool for it, but it's still possible for a few reasonably competent engineers to do within some weeks.