Funding Alert

EdgeQ Raises $75 Million to Ramp Up 5G Chip Production and Adds Lattice Semiconductor CEO to Board of Directors

• ByStartupStory     |    April 20, 2023

EdgeQ, a Silicon Valley-based 5G chip startup, has raised $75 million to aid in production ramp-up as the company starts selling its technology to telecom operators and other customers. Lattice Semiconductor Corp CEO Jim Anderson is also joining EdgeQ’s board of directors. The company designs semiconductors that power base stations for 5G telecom towers and access points for autonomous vehicles and robots inside factories. The chips can also handle 4G cellular signals. According to Vinay Ravuri, CEO and co-founder of EdgeQ, “WiFi is considered best effort, meaning it isn’t guaranteed. If it’s a precise welding machine and it needs to move exactly this much, that has to happen within a microsecond or a millisecond, and you can’t do that in a best effort way.”

The fundraising shows that promising companies can still secure funding despite the recent collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and the banking sector turmoil in March that has affected many startups. EdgeQ has a valuation of “hundreds of millions of dollars” and is “definitely less than” $1 billion, according to Ravuri.

The company uses OpenRAN, an open standards body that enables operators to mix and match suppliers in their radio networks. It has emerged as a competitor to Ericsson, Huawei, and Nokia, which dominate the global telecoms equipment market with their proprietary technologies. EdgeQ has brought down the cost of its base station by around 50% compared to existing options by utilizing the new open standard chip architecture called RISC-V.

Ravuri added that the new open standard chip architecture has made it possible to design its 5G chip more cost-effectively. EdgeQ plans to use the funds to expand its production and enter into partnerships with companies like Microsoft and other telecom operators. The company aims to tap into the growing 5G market, which is expected to reach $668.8 billion by 2026. “The next 10 years are going to be 5G. This is the new infrastructure that’s being built out,” said Ravuri.

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