An apparatus is described. The apparatus includes a circuit to process a binary neural network. The circuit includes an array of processing cores, wherein, processing cores of the array of processing cores are to process different respective areas of a weight matrix of the binary neural network. The processing cores each include add circuitry to add only those weights of an i layer of the binary neural network that are to be effectively multiplied by a non zero nodal output of an i−1 layer of the binary neural network.