California Chip Startup Retym Raises $75M to Build Chips for AI Data Centres

Retym, a chip startup with roots in the US and Israel, has raised $75 million in a Series D funding round led by Spark Capital. This brings the company’s total funding to $180 million, the company announced on Monday.

With this, the company officially launched publicly, out of stealth mode, on Tuesday.

The funding round also saw participation from existing investors Kleiner Perkins, Mayfield, and Fidelity Investments. Retym plans to use this funding to develop programmable coherent digital signal processing (DSP) chips for AI and cloud infrastructure.

“We are focusing on building coherent DSP chips for the next-generation deployment of AI infrastructure and cloud,” said Sachin Gandhi, Retym’s co-founder and CEO. 

The company’s DSP chips are designed to enhance data transmission within and between data centres, addressing the growing demand for faster and more efficient communication as AI workloads increase. 

Retym’s first chip is being manufactured using TSMC’s five-nanometer process and is expected to be launched later this year. Retym aims to challenge Marvell Technology’s dominance in the DSP market.

The Series D funding marks a significant step forward for Retym as it charts a multi-generation product roadmap. 

James Kuklinski, general partner at Spark Capital, has joined Retym’s board of directors following the investment. The funding will support scaling to production and continued product development advancements. 

Retym’s technology is crucial for AI data centres, where thousands of chips must work together efficiently to handle large AI models like ChatGPT. The company was founded in 2021 and has been operating quietly until now.