- The South Korean startup Furiosaai rejected a takeover of $ 800 from Meta
- The agreement collapsed on post-acquisition plans despite an assessment above the market
- Furiosaai has chosen to remain independent and will launch his RNGD chip this year
While the demand for AI infrastructure continues to grow, hyperscalers like Meta, Microsoft and Google are actively working to reduce their dependence on expensive Nvidia equipment by developing their own personalized silicon. Meta would have started to test her first internal AI training chip, as part of a wider thrust to take more control over her AI battery.
In addition to her internal efforts, Meta also explored the acquisitions of promising IA fog manufacturers to strengthen her material capacities.
One of these objectives was the Korean startup Furiosaai, which the technology giant considered a solid candidate to help accelerate his IA infrastructure ambitions. Meta made a buy-off offer worth $ 800 million (around 1.2 Won Billion) for the company, but despite the offer on around 400 billion won (around $ 300 million) above the estimated market value of Furiosaai, it was postponed.
A difference in opinion
According to Maeil Business JournalNegotiations broke down due to contradictory visions on the future of the company. The management of Furiosaai has chosen to move away from the agreement and continue to operate independently in the semiconductor space of the increasingly competitive AI.
“Since October of last year, Meta has envisaged several AI semiconductor companies in the United States and Israel, and finally chose Furiosaai as a solid acquisition objective and concluded negotiations at the start of the year,” said an initiate familiar with the company to the company Maeil Business Journal.
“I understand that the negotiations broke down because the two parties could not reduce their differences on the management of the company and the organizational structure after the acquisition, rather than the price.”
Founded in 2017 by the CEO June Paik, Furiosaai specializes in the design of AI fleas and currently employs around 140 people – more than 90% of whom are developers, including engineers from Google, Qualcomm and Samsung.
The flagship product of the company, RNGD (pronounced “renegat”), unveiled on Hot Chips 2024, is an AI high performance chip built on the 5NM process of TSMC and equipped with a double HBM3 memory.
According to Furiosaai, it twice the efficiency of traditional GPUs while consuming only a quarter of power, so it is easy to see the call to Meta.
RNGD’s mass production should start in the second half of 2025 and Maeil Business Journal The reports according to which a number of large organizations, including LG AI Research and Saudi Aramco, have registered to test the performance of the chip.
Furiosaai has raised around 70 billion won (around $ 52 million) of funding to support its production of fleas and operational costs.
