Tenstorrent hits $6.2B valuation to scale open-weight AI chips — SkimNews
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- Tenstorrent raised $1.5 billion at a $6.2 billion valuation, more than doubling its previous $2.6 billion valuation from late 2024
- Tenstorrent will use the new capital to scale chips tailored for serving open-weight AI models and video generation workloads
- Jim Keller, Tenstorrent CEO and prominent microprocessor engineer, said the company chose independence after demonstrating its Galaxy servers could run DeepSeek models
- Trace Capital and Innovation X co-led the funding round, with participation from Cadence Ventures, Eclipse, Fidelity, SanDisk, and T. Rowe Price
- Tenstorrent had previously drawn acquisition interest from Intel and Qualcomm at valuations up to $5 billion, five months before this round
- Etched, another AI chip startup, is reportedly fielding investment offers at valuations of $40 billion or more, highlighting intensified competition in AI hardware
Why it matters: Tenstorrent’s $1.5 billion raise at a $6.2 billion valuation gives it substantial firepower to challenge Nvidia in AI inference, a market where few startups have secured such scale. The funding validates demand for open-weight AI infrastructure just as investor appetite for AI hardware alternatives appears to be accelerating, as seen in Etched’s $40 billion interest.
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