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Cerebras Systems, a Silicon Valley startup aiming to challenge Nvidia in the artificial intelligence chip market, has secured $1.1 billion in new funding, pushing its valuation to $8.1 billion. The deal gives the company more breathing room as it continues to delay a long-anticipated public offering.
The fresh capital comes from a roster of heavyweight investors including Fidelity, Tiger Global, Valor Equity Partners, Altimeter, Alpha Wave, Atreides Management, and 1789 Capital, the venture firm where Donald Trump Jr. is a partner. Co-founder and CEO Andrew Feldman said the money will be used to significantly expand U.S.-based manufacturing as global demand for AI infrastructure accelerates.
Cerebras first filed for an IPO in September 2024 but was slowed by scrutiny over its ties to G42, an Abu Dhabi-based AI company. U.S. regulators delayed approval of G42's $335 million stake until earlier this year. The clearance allowed Cerebras to continue supplying supercomputing systems to G42 and explore deals with companies like Saudi oil giant Aramco, although further exports still require federal licenses.
Despite regulatory hurdles, investors have nearly doubled the company's valuation since its last major raise in 2021. Feldman insists the IPO is still on the horizon: "When you have enormous opportunities in front of you, you don't want to miss them for lack of capital," he told reporters.
Cerebras designs the world's largest AI chip, roughly the size of a dinner plate, built to train and run massive language and vision models. Alongside hardware, it operates cloud-based services that allow clients such as Hugging Face, Meta, Notion, and Perplexity to handle compute-heavy workloads.
Revenue is growing quickly, with the company reportedly generating about $70 million in the second quarter of 2024, compared to just $6 million a year earlier. To meet rising demand, Feldman said manufacturing capacity has already increased eightfold in the past 18 months and is set to quadruple again within a year.
For now, Cerebras remains private, but with its balance sheet reinforced and high-profile backers on board, the path to Wall Street looks clearer than it did a year ago.
The fresh capital comes from a roster of heavyweight investors including Fidelity, Tiger Global, Valor Equity Partners, Altimeter, Alpha Wave, Atreides Management, and 1789 Capital, the venture firm where Donald Trump Jr. is a partner. Co-founder and CEO Andrew Feldman said the money will be used to significantly expand U.S.-based manufacturing as global demand for AI infrastructure accelerates.
Cerebras first filed for an IPO in September 2024 but was slowed by scrutiny over its ties to G42, an Abu Dhabi-based AI company. U.S. regulators delayed approval of G42's $335 million stake until earlier this year. The clearance allowed Cerebras to continue supplying supercomputing systems to G42 and explore deals with companies like Saudi oil giant Aramco, although further exports still require federal licenses.
Despite regulatory hurdles, investors have nearly doubled the company's valuation since its last major raise in 2021. Feldman insists the IPO is still on the horizon: "When you have enormous opportunities in front of you, you don't want to miss them for lack of capital," he told reporters.
Cerebras designs the world's largest AI chip, roughly the size of a dinner plate, built to train and run massive language and vision models. Alongside hardware, it operates cloud-based services that allow clients such as Hugging Face, Meta, Notion, and Perplexity to handle compute-heavy workloads.
Revenue is growing quickly, with the company reportedly generating about $70 million in the second quarter of 2024, compared to just $6 million a year earlier. To meet rising demand, Feldman said manufacturing capacity has already increased eightfold in the past 18 months and is set to quadruple again within a year.
For now, Cerebras remains private, but with its balance sheet reinforced and high-profile backers on board, the path to Wall Street looks clearer than it did a year ago.
