According to at least one example embodiment, a multi-chip system includes multiple chip devices configured to communicate to each other and share hardware resources. According to at least one example embodiment, a method of processing work item in the multi-chip system comprises designating, by a work source component associated with a chip device, referred to as the source chip device, of the multiple chip devices, a work item to a scheduler for scheduling. The scheduler then assigns the work item to a another chip device, referred to as the destination chip device, of the multiple chip devices for processing, the scheduler is one of one or more schedulers each associated with a corresponding chip device of the multiple chip devices.