RISC-V architecture AI chip company Jindi Space-Time secures hundreds of millions of yuan in new financing, and its new generation of RISC-V AI chips is about to be released | Hardcore Kr 1st Release

Yingke has learned that "Jindie Space-Time", a company that develops and sells next-generation AI chips based on the RISC-V architecture, has completed a Series B financing of hundreds of millions of yuan. We have summarized the information of this round of financing and several highlights of the company:

1. Financing Amount and Investment Institutions

Financing Round: Series B

Financing Scale: Hundreds of millions of RMB

Investors: Including China Internet Investment Fund, Agricultural Bank of China AIC, Beijing Artificial Intelligence Industry Investment Fund, Beijing Guanguan Shunxi Fund, Huaxia Hengtian, Guangyuan Capital, etc. Existing shareholders have continued to increase their investments.

Use of Funds: The company will continue to invest in achieving extreme breakthroughs in RISC-V general AI computing power to support the development of new applications such as AI computers and AI robots. In addition, the funds will support the company's research and development and industrialization of full-stack core technologies, cloud AI inference chips, cloud server AI CPU chips, and terminal AI CPU chips.

2. Basic Company Information

Establishment Time: November 2021

Registered Address: Hangzhou

Technological Highlights: Self - developed full - stack core technologies, including high - performance RISC - V CPU cores, general RISC - V AI cores, NoC interconnect buses, chips, and software systems. Using the RISC - V instruction set as a unified software - hardware interface, it provides general AI computing power to promote and popularize the RISC - V + AI + Triton/Tilelang intelligent computing ecosystem.

3. Market Size

RISC - V will become the mainstream computing system in the next era and is a crucial opportunity for the country's computing chips to overtake others on a new track. In the short to medium term, the total global market size of RISC - V computing chips is approximately 318 billion RMB. In the long term, all terminal electronic products will be re - engineered with local large models. The market sizes of humanoid robots and cloud AI chips will also increase significantly. AI computers, embodied intelligence, and cloud computing centers will build a market worth trillions of US dollars.

4. Company Performance

The company has self - developed and delivered three generations of RISC - V CPU cores. The latest high - performance RISC - V CPU core has a performance of over 16 points/GHz SPECINT2006. The first - generation mass - produced terminal RISC - V AI CPU chip, K1, has achieved a shipment volume of 150,000 units, making it the chip with the largest mass - production quantity of high - computing - power RISC - V chips in China. The second - generation terminal RISC - V AI chip, K3, has returned from fabrication and will be released soon.

The company started with edge - side AI applications and has upgraded to meet the needs of cloud - side AI application fields. It entered the market through sectors such as general robots, industrial computing, and the ecological market, quickly opened up the market using the team's existing mature resources, and then gradually penetrated into high - end chip application scenarios such as AI computers, high - end robots, large - model inference, and cloud computing server CPUs.

5. Team Background

The company's founder, Chen Zhijian, graduated with a doctorate from Zhejiang University. He began researching domestic processors in 2006, won the First Prize of Zhejiang Provincial Technological Invention, and was included in the national talent support program. Another founder, Sun Yanbang, has been engaged in chip software R & D and system design since 2008. He was responsible for the software R & D and product implementation of more than 10 chips, with a cumulative mass production of over one billion units, covering application fields such as intelligent robots and industry.

The core team of Jindie Space - Time comes from well - known companies such as Alibaba T-Head, Huawei HiSilicon, and Allwinner Technology. It is one of the few teams in China with the full - stack self - development and commercial mass - production capabilities from instruction sets, IP cores, chips, software to complete machines. The current team has more than 280 people, with R & D personnel accounting for more than 80% and postgraduate and doctoral students accounting for more than 50%.

6. Q&A with the Founder

Yingke: Why did you choose to leave T - Head and start a business in the RISC - V field?

Chen Zhijian: As a native of Zhejiang, I have always had a desire to start a business since childhood. At that time, I also met excellent complementary partners and senior angel investors. On the other hand, based on my years of industry experience, I believe that artificial intelligence is not a bubble because it can significantly enhance human intelligence and productivity. As an open - source and open computing architecture, RISC - V has three core logics: "equal rights", "sense of participation", and "incentive mechanism", which can replay the process of open - source software reshaping the information age. RISC - V liberates the "root technology" of hardware from the private property of specific enterprises (such as X86 or ARM) and realizes technological equal rights. I think this open - source power has more long - term vitality.

Yingke: What are the core advantages of Jindie Space - Time's insistence on self - developing core products such as CPU cores and AI cores?

Chen Zhijian: We attach great importance to the independent control of root technologies. Most RISC - V start - up companies in the market do not have control over core IPs and can only purchase CPU or AI cores externally. This makes product iteration subject to suppliers, and chips are prone to failure due to suppliers' code bugs. Jindie Space - Time adheres to self - developing core technologies, enabling us to tightly control market demand and product iteration in our own hands, just like Apple and Huawei.

One of our core advantages is the general applicability for AI algorithms. Different from dedicated architectures, general computing power can support a wider range of AI applications. On the other hand, by making AI computing power more accessible, we can promote the wider popularization of AI applications. The arrival of a technological era requires the most important production resources of that era to be affordable. For example, an important factor in the arrival of the Internet era was that the price of computers dropped from 10,000 yuan to 4,000 - 5,000 yuan, making them affordable for both enterprises and ordinary consumers, which led to the prosperity of the entire ecosystem.

For CPU cores, we will conduct specific optimizations for artificial intelligence and robot scenarios, such as visual processing and SLAM navigation mapping, to achieve extremely high energy - efficiency ratios. We believe that this ability to deeply integrate core technologies with vertical scenarios is the fundamental reason for us to stand out among many start - up companies.

Yingke: Can you introduce the upcoming second - generation chip, K3?

Chen Zhijian: We are very optimistic about the intelligentization trend on the edge and end sides and believe that everything will have a local large model. Therefore, the market positioning of our K3 chip is also for end - side intelligentization, targeting the "30B (30 billion parameters) large model", filling the gap in the market for chips specifically positioned for this scale on the end side. Compared with the difficult exploration of the first - generation product, K1, in a highly competitive field, the logic of K3 is more like that of "Li Auto", precisely targeting a niche market and innovating the intelligent experience of existing devices.

Yingke: What are the product plans and business growth goals of Jindie Space - Time in the future?

Chen Zhijian: In terms of product rhythm, we adhere to launching a new generation of chips every year and require the CPU computing power and AI computing power of each generation of products to increase by 4 - 8 times. Currently, the company has laid out two product lines for the edge and cloud sides: the second - generation end - side chip, K3, is expected to be released in January 2026, and the third - generation cloud - side chip is also planned to be launched in the second half of 2026.

In terms of business growth, the company aims for exponential revenue growth. Starting from the third year after the company's establishment, when it generates tens of millions of yuan in revenue, the goal is to triple the revenue every year. Although industry statistics show that it usually takes 7 - 8 years for a chip company to reach a revenue of 100 million yuan, we are trying to accelerate the commercialization process by extremely compressing the R & D cycle and providing overall computing solutions. The future core strategy is to deeply cultivate the two incremental markets of "AI +" and "robots" and transform traditional industries with high - performance RISC - V chips.

7. Investors' Views

Shunxi Fund said: As an open - source instruction set architecture, RISC - V has global consensus and global standards, and is expected to become the mainstream computing system in the next era. It is also an important choice for the independent development of domestic CPUs. The core team of Jindie Space - Time has full - stack technical capabilities from the RISC - V instruction set, computing IP, chips, tool software to complete machines, and has extremely strong commercialization implementation capabilities, which are rare in China. In the wave of AI, the company's self - developed Spacemit isomorphic fusion technology highlights the advantages of its AI chips. We are optimistic about the company's growth into a benchmark enterprise in the RISC - V and AI fields.

China Internet Investment Fund said: AI and robots are triggering a wave of computing power reconstruction. RISC - V has become a competitor for new computing power due to its advantages of openness, customizability, and modularity. Jindie Space - Time is an excellent domestic team that has achieved full - stack self - development from IP to chips to software and has achieved mass production and shipment. We have noticed that the RISC - V ecosystem in China is gradually maturing. China Internet Investment Fund will continue to pay attention to investment opportunities in cutting - edge fields such as RISC - V to help build a safe and reliable computing power system. We believe that with the continuous improvement of the ecosystem and the expansion of application scenarios, the company will have broader development space and inject innovative impetus into the high - quality development of the industry.