Qualcomm Participates in $65.4 Million Series D Funding for RISC-V Supplier SiFive
SiFive, Inc. announced that it has raised $65.4 million in a Series D funding round. Existing investors Sutter Hill Ventures, Spark Capital, Chengwei Capital, Huami, and Osage University Partners led the funding round along with new investor Qualcomm Ventures LLC. This funding round brings the total investment in SiFive so far to more than $125 million.
"SiFive continues to drive rapid RISC-V growth, development and adoption," said Stefan Dyckerhoff, managing director at Sutter Hill Ventures and member of the SiFive board of directors. "We are seeing significant traction across numerous markets and verticals, as evidenced by SiFive's 101 design wins. SiFive's expertise in RISC-V Core IP, complete silicon solutions and a native cloud environment is a key differentiator. Sutter Hill Ventures continues to strongly believe in - and invest in - SiFive's vision to democratize access to custom silicon."
SiFive says that this latest round of investment will further enable and accelerate the company's global expansion and technology development.
During the last 18 months, SiFive has expanded from under 40 employees in a single office to more than 400 employees across 15 locations worldwide. The company now has offices in Beaverton, Oregon; Austin, Texas; San Mateo and Milpitas, California; Boston; as well as Pune and Bangalore, India; Seoul, Korea; Shanghai; and Hsinchu, Taiwan.
"Qualcomm Ventures invests in innovative technology companies that have the potential to transform industries." said Quinn Li, senior vice president, Qualcomm Technologies Inc. and global head of Qualcomm Ventures. "SiFive has established itself as a leader in the RISC-V space making significant contributions to the broader semiconductor industry through its unique design methodology. We are excited to invest in SiFive to bring the potential of RISC-V to wireless and mobile."
SiFive says it is uniquely positioned to take advantage of the need for custom silicon as device makers rapidly adopt domain-specific application processor designs. This switch to domain-specific processor designs is in response to the point of computing moving to the edge.
Both customers and investors seek SiFive's portfolio of solutions, its cloud platform, as well as its strategic partnerships.
"We are honored and privileged to have the backing, expertise, and experience of our investors and our board," said Naveed Sherwani, president and CEO of SiFive. "Hypergrowth and industry disruption cannot happen without bold commitment. We are proud to count on our incredible investors and champions as a key part of how we grow in select markets and verticals, access platforms and technologies, find talent, and partner with giants in order to realize our vision."
SiFive is a supplier of processor core IP and silicon solutions based on the free and open RISC-V instruction set architecture.
