- Tencent positions itself as a viable alternative to Nvidia
- Startup plans to increase hiring for engineering roles after new funding
- Interoperability is a major appeal for Tensorrent
AI chip startup Tencent has secured $700 million in funding as part of an investment round valuing the company at $2.6 billion.
The investment, led by AFW Partners and SAMSUNG Securities also include financing pledges lg Electronics, Fidelity and Bezos Expeditions, the venture capital firm started by the former Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos.
The company says the funding will play a key role in enabling it to expand its headcount, further develop supply chain capabilities, and build an AI training server to demonstrate its technologies.
major expansion
Tencentor specializes in developing powerful, cost-effective chips specifically for use in AI development. It is noteworthy that the company uses open source The technology is in its development, enabling it to replace the expensive high-bandwidth memory (HBM) currently used. NVIDIA,
Similarly, it also focuses heavily on interoperability with other providers, and has been a vocal proponent of the open-standard RISC-V processor architecture.
According to CEO Jim Keller, this aspect of the company’s operations makes the Santa Clara-headquartered company an attractive alternative to Nvidia.
“If you use Nvidia you can’t beat that hbmBecause Nvidia buys the most HBM and has a cost advantage. But the way HBM is built into their products and their sockets, they will never be able to lower the price,” Keller said in a statement.
Enterprises have been attempting to find alternatives to Nvidia amid its rise to prominence in the global tech industry in recent years, and Tencent is one of a number aiming to fill that void.
In March 2024, Toronto-based AI chip startup Talas secured $50 million in funding – again aimed at challenging the GPU-centricity of the industry created by Nvidia’s dominance.
While Tenstore is still a relatively young firm, it has already secured contracts worth approximately $150 million and is experiencing significant growth.
The company’s first chips to hit the market were manufactured as part of a deal with GlobalFoundries. launch of grayskullTenortorrent’s RISC-V alternative was designed to be far easier to program and scale.
The future chip series will be created through an agreement with TSMC and Samsung. This includes the development of a 2nm AI accelerator, but exact details on release dates have not yet been determined.
In the long term, the company intends to release a new AI processor every year.
through bloomberg
