AheadComputing, a Portland, Ore.-based chip startup that designs and licenses CPU cores aimed at boosting performance for AI and data center workloads, announced a $30 million funding round.
Founded in 2024 and led by former Intel engineering leaders, AheadComputing says its CPU cores are faster and more efficient than existing options for AI-heavy workloads.
The startup is building CPU cores based on RISC-V, an open-source instruction set that lets companies customize chips instead of relying on proprietary architectures.
GPUs may dominate headlines, but CPU performance remains critical to how efficiently AI applications run at scale. CPUs manage data movement, run core software, and handle tasks that can’t easily be split up across multiple cores.
AheadComputing has nearly 120 employees and is led by CEO Debbie Marr, who spent more than three decades at Intel and was chief architect of the Advanced Architecture Development Group (AADG) at the chip giant.
“This additional funding will allow us to continue to challenge traditional rules and sustain a fast pace of transformation and develop the fastest high-performance, general-purpose CPU because everybody deserves better compute,” Marr said in a statement.
Eclipse, Toyota Ventures, and Cambium co-led AheadComputing’s latest round, which included participation from Corner, Trousdale Ventures, EPIQ, MESH, and Stata. The company, which raised a $21.5 million round last year, also added Tenstorrent CEO Jim Keller to its board.
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