Rapid Silicon raises $30M to develop FPGA for edge applications
Rapid Silicon, a company that designs application-specific FPGA devices, recently secured $30 million in funding to launch its low-end product, Gemini. Cambium Capital and other existing investors led the seed round funding to $15 million. With this funding, the company also aims to solidify its foothold in the market by increasing its use of open-source technology for commercial edge applications.
“With open-source software, Rapid Silicon is removing the barriers and providing its customers with a robust end-to-end FPGA design workflow,” said Dr. Naveed Sherwani, the chairman and CEO of Rapid Silicon. “The open-source software enables users to design complex applications quickly and efficiently on our FPGA devices.”
Rapid Silicon’s Gemini product is a fully customizable programmable logic device that enables users to customize it according to their unique needs and specifications. Built for sensor processing and thermal profiling, the FPGA device is miniature, ideal for applications at the edge, the company says.
Gemini FPGA uses TSMC’s 16nm process technology to offer high performance and power efficiency. Its architecture includes six fracturable input LUTs with carry chain and registered outputs. Besides the hardened RISC-V processor core, the device also features a dual-core Arm Cortex-A53 processor core and a DRAM controller that can reach speeds up to 2166 Mbps.
According to Rapid Silicon, traditional programmable logic devices must meet the increasing demand for IP integration in power-constrained applications. Gemini meets these criteria and overcomes performance tradeoffs, the company says. The device uses FlexNoc interconnect IP, which reduces routing congestion, improves performance and also reduces latency.
“We see immense potential in the company’s AI-enhanced EDA tools, and we believe this team has the experience needed to bring these solutions to the global market,” said Landon Downs, the managing partner at Cambium Capital.
Article Topics
chip | edge devices | FPGA | Rapid Silicon | RISC-V | TSMC
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