Excited to share that leading provider of AI hardware acceleration technology Axelera AI, an Award-winner at Tech Tour Deeptech 2022, has successfully closed an oversubscribed $68 million Series B funding round. This milestone marks Europe's largest Series B funding in the fabless semiconductor industry, propelling Axelera AI into new markets and solidifying its position as a key player in AI hardware. 

Powering Global AI Innovation 

Axelera AI is renowned for its Metis™ AI Processing Unit (AIPU), the world’s most powerful AIPU for edge devices. This groundbreaking technology powers next-generation AI inference solutions, particularly in computer vision and generative AI. With the new funding, Axelera AI is set to expand the mass adoption of its Metis™ AI Platform, which achieves a 3-5x increase in efficiency and performance compared to current alternatives. 

Accelerating Market Expansion and Broadening Horisons 

The $68 million Series B funding round, bringing Axelera AI's total capital raised to $120 million, will accelerate the company’s expansion into diverse markets. The company targets global expansion with a focus on North America, Europe, and the Middle East. The Series B funding will support this geographic expansion and foster growth across key vertical markets such as automotive, digital healthcare, Industry 4.0, retail, robotics, drones, and surveillance. Furthermore, the funding will enable Axelera AI to extend its product offerings from edge devices to data centers, addressing the burgeoning computing needs for generative AI and large language models. 

Innovation in AI Hardware 

Axelera AI’s Metis™ AI Platform, set for full production in the second half of 2024, is designed to overcome industry challenges related to energy consumption, cost, and scalability. The platform’s proprietary digital in-memory computing and RISC-V technology deliver unmatched performance and efficiency. This approach minimizes data movement between memory and compute elements, addressing the "Memory Wall" challenge and significantly reducing power consumption, a critical factor for AI applications at the edge. 

Strategic Investors 

The Series B funding round attracted a diverse group of institutional investors, including Invest-NL Deep Tech Fund, the European Innovation Council Fund, Innovation Industries Strategic Partners Fund, and the Samsung Catalyst Fund. Existing investors like Verve Ventures, Innovation Industries, Fractionelera, and CDP Venture Capital also participated.  

Vision for the Future 

Fabrizio Del Maffeo, Co-Founder and CEO of Axelera AI, emphasized the transformative potential of AI across various sectors. “This funding supports our mission to democratize access to artificial intelligence, from the edge to the cloud. By expanding our product lines beyond the edge computing market, we can address industry challenges in AI inference and support current and future AI processing needs with our scalable, proven technology,” he stated. 

For further information about Axelera AI and its solutions, visit Axelera AI. 

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