Samsung backs AI chip startup Rebellions forward of IPO

South Korean synthetic intelligence chip startup Rebellions has raised cash from tech large Samsung and is focusing on a funding spherical of as much as $200 million forward of a public itemizing, the corporate’s administration advised CNBC on Tuesday.

Final yr, Rebellions merged with one other startup in South Korea referred to as Sapeon, making a agency that’s being positioned as one of many nation’s promising rivals to Nvidia.

Rebellions is presently elevating cash and is focusing on funding of between $150 million and $200 million, Sungkyue Shin, chief monetary officer of the startup, advised CNBC on Tuesday.

Samsung’s funding in Rebellions final week was a part of that, Shin stated, although he declined to say how a lot the tech large poured in.

Since its founding in 2020, Rebellions has raised $220 million, Shin added.

The present funding spherical is ongoing and Shin stated Rebellions is speaking to its present traders in addition to traders in Korea and globally to take part within the capital elevate. Rebellions has some large traders, together with South Korean chip large SK Hynix, telecommunication companies SK Telecom and Korea Telecom, and Saudi Arabian oil large Aramco.

Rebellions was final valued at $1 billion. Shin stated the present spherical of funding would push the valuation over $1 billion however declined to offer particular determine.

Rebellions is aiming for an preliminary public providing as soon as this funding spherical has closed.

“Our grasp plan goes public,” Shin stated.

Rebellions designs chips which might be targeted on AI inferencing relatively than coaching. Inferencing is when a pre-trained AI mannequin interprets reside information to provide you with a consequence, very similar to the solutions which might be produced by well-liked chatbots.

With the backing of main South Korean companies and traders, Rebellions is hoping to make a worldwide play the place it is going to look to problem Nvidia and AMD in addition to a slew of different startups within the inferencing area.

Rebellions has been working with Samsung to carry its second-generation chip, Insurgent, to market. Samsung owns a chip manufacturing enterprise, also called foundry. 4 Insurgent chips are put collectively to make the Insurgent-Quad, the product that Rebellions will finally promote. A Rebellions spokesperson stated the chip might be launched later this yr.

The funding will partly go towards Rebellions’ product growth. Rebellions is presently testing its chip which can finally be produced on a bigger scale by Samsung.

“Preliminary outcomes have been very promising,” Sunghyun Park, CEO of Rebellions, advised CNBC on Tuesday.

Park stated Samsung invested in Rebellions partly due to the the nice outcomes that the chip has thus far produced.

Samsung is manufacturing Rebellions’ semiconductor utilizing its 4 nanometer course of, which is among the many modern chipmaking nodes. For comparability, Nvidia’s present Blackwell chips use the 4 nanometer course of from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Rebellions can even use excessive bandwidth reminiscence (HBM) in its chips. The sort of reminiscence is stacked and is required to deal with massive information processing hundreds. Rebellions has not chosen an HBM vendor.