Based in 2015 and primarily based in San Francisco, California, Cerebras goals to speed up synthetic intelligence (AI) and alter the way forward for AI work. Cerebras has developed a brand new class of AI laptop programs and launched one of many largest and quickest AI semiconductor chips in March 2024. Let’s dive into Cerebras’ historical past and milestones to evaluate what would possibly make this firm stand out from different semiconductor corporations.
Cerebras’ 5 co-founders, Andrew Feldman, Gary Lauterbach, Michael James, Sean Lie, and Jean-Philippe Fricker, labored collectively at SeaMicro, an ultra-dense laptop server firm, which was based by Feldman and Lauterbach. After SeaMicro was bought to AMD in 2012, the 5 stayed for some time however determined to begin one thing new.
Why?
In an interview with ServeTheHome from 2020, Feldman revealed that the concept for Cerebras got here from asking “why?” In essence, Lauterbach had requested, “why would a 25-year-old processor constructed and tuned to push pixels to a pc monitor be good at deep studying?” In 2015, computer systems and {hardware} weren’t being constructed to help superior AI fashions, facilitate machine studying, and course of the huge quantities of information required to coach giant language fashions.
From there, the founders explored what might be completed to unravel the dearth of reminiscence and required giant time commitments to deliberately create computing chips designed for AI. Cerebras was born in 2015 with the aim to vary the way forward for AI.
Stealth Mode
The corporate maintained a low profile for the primary 4 years of operations, constructing quietly behind the scenes. Lastly in 2019, Cerebras unveiled the trade’s first trillion transistor chip – the end result of analysis and years of labor. The Wafer Scale Engine (WSE) was one of many largest laptop chips ever constructed – that includes the biggest reminiscence bandwidth and highest pace, optimized for AI work. Cerebras went on to unveil further supercomputers like Andromeda in 2022 and launched its largest iteration of the WSE but, the WSE-3 in March 2024.
The Imaginative and prescient
“We’re engineers who are usually not afraid. We like doing work that different individuals shrink back from as a result of it’s both too exhausting or they’re afraid or they’ll’t increase the capital to do it…[we] got down to do one thing profound and transformative. We needed that after they informed the historical past of the primary 50 years of the twenty first century of compute that there was a chapter on us. These guys did issues that different individuals tried and failed; they made it work.” – Andrew Feldman
Cerebras Milestones
Cerebras has achieved quite a few milestones throughout the previous few years. Among the current main highlights for Cerebras embody:
- Confidentially filed for an IPO in August 2024 that would are available 2024, with Citigroup and Barclays aiding as underwriters.
- Unveiled the Wafer Scale Engine 3 (WSE-3) in March 2024, which the corporate stories to be the quickest AI chip on Earth.
- Signed a multi-million-dollar settlement with the Mayo Clinic in January 2024 to develop AI fashions for the healthcare trade.
- Forbes reported in December 2023 that Cerebras’ income and buyer commitments had been approaching $1 billion.
Cerebras Funding Rounds
Cerebras has raised $715 million over six funding rounds. The next is a breakdown of the bigger named funding rounds.
Collection A/ Collection B
In Could 2016, Cerebras raised $27 million from Basis Capital and Eclipse Ventures. And simply seven months later, Cerebras raised one other $25 million from Benchmark Capital. Cerebras was working in stealth mode and never even TechCrunch may discover a lot data concerning the firm on the time of the increase past, “What we’ve heard from sources is that the corporate is engaged on a specialised next-generation chip (presumably a GPU) for deep-learning purposes.”
Collection C/Collection D
After which in 2017, solely six months after its Collection B, Cerebras raised one other $60 million from Sequoia, Scale-Up, Basis Capital, Eclipse Ventures, Benchmark Capital, and Altimeter Capital. Solely a bit extra info had come out concerning the firm however public curiosity was actually being piqued with Forbes touting the close to $1 billion valuation in a September article.
Nonetheless in stealth, Cerebras didn’t communicate publicly for over a yr earlier than elevating $80 million in Collection D capital in November 2018. New buyers within the spherical included Coatue and Vy Capital with participation from current buyers Benchmark, Altimeter, and Basis.
Rising from Stealth
Between its Collection D and Collection E rounds, Cerebras lastly unveiled what it had been engaged on the previous 4 years: the Wafer Scale Engine (WSE). One of many world’s largest laptop chips ever constructed, the WSE reportedly has the best pace and largest reminiscence to course of giant quantities of information faster than different chips available on the market.
Collection E/Collection F/IPO?
Cerebras raised $272 million in Collection E funding in late 2019 earlier than elevating a further $250 million in Collection F funding in November 2021 at an over $4 billion valuation. Aiming to redefine what it means to work with AI, Cerebras is now pursuing an IPO as of August 2024.
Cerebras Awards
The next are some notable awards that Cerebras has acquired within the current previous:
- Ranked on the Forbes AI 50 for 2024
- Named to the TIME100 Most Influential Firms 2024
- Positioned third on CRN’s 10 Hottest Semiconductor Startups of 2024
Closing Ideas
Working in stealth for a majority of the corporate’s historical past, Cerebras has taken steps to reply questions that appeared tough. Continually reporting trade firsts corresponding to “world’s largest” and “world’s quickest”, Cerebras seems to be effectively poised to disrupt the AI trade. Taking up bigger funding rounds as a result of excessive analysis prices related to disrupting computing programs, it might be fascinating to see what alternatives Cerebras creates within the trade.
Wish to study extra about different MicroVentures portfolio corporations disrupting their industries? Take a look at the next blogs to study extra:
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