Intel Veterans Raise $22M To Disrupt The Semiconductor Industry With The ‘Baddest CPU In The World,’ Backed By Apple And AMD Alum Jim Keller
Beaverton, Oregon-based semiconductor startup AheadComputing, founded by four former Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) central processing unit architects, announced in February that it secured $21.5 million in seed funding to develop a new class of high-performance processors based on the RISC-V architecture.
The seed funding round was led by Eclipse Ventures, with participation from Maverick Capital, Fundomo, and EPIQ Capital. The company also added Jim Keller to its board of directors. Keller is widely regarded as one of the foremost chip designers in the world, having held engineering leadership roles at Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ:AMD), Intel, and Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA), The Oregonian reports.
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The company, established in 2024, is aiming to design a scalable and power-efficient CPU that challenges x86 dominance in the data center and artificial intelligence sectors, The Oregonian says. Led by CEO Debbie Marr, AheadComputing intends to deliver what it calls the “biggest, baddest CPU in the world.”
RISC-V, a royalty-free, open instruction set architecture, is emerging as a credible alternative to proprietary platforms such as Intel’s x86 and ARM’s licensed designs. According to The Oregonian, the architecture enables companies to create customized processors without licensing restrictions or vendor lock-in.
AheadComputing’s team has grown to 80 employees, many of whom previously held senior roles at Intel. The company is targeting high-performance workloads in cloud infrastructure, AI inference, and edge computing applications. Its design leverages the modular “chiplet” model, allowing for flexible system-on-chip configurations tailored to specific customer needs, The Oregonian reports.
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Co-founder Jonathan Pearce told The Oregonian that the fragmentation of computing systems presents an opportunity for specialized vendors to offer optimized components within larger heterogeneous systems. “You get the opportunity for a company like AheadComputing to provide that piece of the overall system. As opposed to the past 20 years where it was just one tech giant,” Pearce said.
