The world has been chaotic lately - market swings, tariffs, companies being acquired (Kinara by NXP), other companies are refusing acquisition (Furiosa allegedly declined an $800m buyout from Meta), DeepSeek made everyone question the future of closed AI models and model scaling, while OpenAI’s Sam Altman committed to an “open-weight” AI model to come out this summer - something no one thought would happen.
As I was reflecting on all of these, and Axelera’s state in it all, I find myself incredibly grateful.
Despite everything happening around us, our team has been focusing on what we can control: solving customer problems, building world-class technology, and partnering with some of the world’s best technology providers. So much to be thankful for, and I want to share some of these reasons with you.
We have seen amazing progress towards our vision of bringing artificial intelligence to everyone, to truly democratize what could be the most revolutionary technology we have seen in our lifetime.
I am proud to share the latest milestones as we continue to drive innovation, growth, and the democratization of AI. The milestones can be divided in 5 main categories:
- Product & Commercial traction
- Funding
- Partnerships
- Democratization of our technology
- Supporting Europe’s audacious sovereign initiatives
Product & Commercial traction
Our first products, the Metis AIPU and the Voyager SDK are both shipping to customers in production, and companies or developers wanting to test can now purchase from our very own webstore and get the hardware in their hands in a matter of days. We also published the Voyager SDK on GitHub, launched our Model Zoo.
We recently launched our AI single-board computer which integrates in the same board a powerful RockChip 3588 with our Metis
AI processing unit: you can get a high-end edge AI computer with 210 TOPs AI computing power in a standard mini-ITX form-factor! You can pre-order at special discounted price!
We are also preparing for the launch of a powerful PCI-e card with 4 Metis AI processing units. Stay tuned for the pre-order announcement.
Customers like duagon have demonstrated with us at Embedded World to showcase how our Metis product, paired with their industrial solutions, can help improve railway operations.
We are continuing to partner with the channel ecosystem too and are proud to be working with Azulle and Arcobel, and look forward to more announcements in this space soon.
Order directly from the Axelera AI store
Funding
Axelera AI recently secured up to €61.6 million in funding from the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking and member states to develop Titania, a high-performance, energy-efficient, and scalable AI inference chiplet. This funding, part of the Digital Autonomy with RISC-V for Europe (DARE) Project, will support the development of a very high-performance, high-efficiency chiplets based on Axelera AI's innovative Digital In-Memory Computing (D-IMC) architecture, which enables near-linear scalability from the edge to the cloud.
We were selected for the EIC Step Up program which will provide investments of between €10 and €30 million (per company) aiming to leverage private co-investment and achieve financing rounds of €50 to €150 million or more. What an honor to be selected from the 34 applicants to receive this additional equity investment!
With this new funding, Axelera AI has raised over $225 million USD in just three years, further solidifying our position as a leader in AI hardware acceleration technology.
Partnerships
Between Embedded World, ISC West, and CES, we have been proud to showcase our work with partners like SeeChange, Lenovo, Dell, Aetina, Advantech, Seco, Duagon, and many others!
We recently demonstrated running real-time analytics on an 8k video stream. When we took this demo to ISC West, I was reminded of how our industry-standard form factor approach is helping make integration simple for customers. The quick story is our demo systems were caught in US customs coming from Amsterdam – not for tariffs 
- so the team purchased a gaming PC off the shelf in Las Vegas, borrowed some 8K cameras from our friends at Axis, and were able to showcase the powerful capabilities of Metis! For more details, please see the blog.
At the Embedded World in Nuremberg, duagon and Axelera AI showcased two pre-series products with integrated Metis AIPUs, highlighting the potential of high-performance AI applications at the embedded level. The AIPU modules, which leverage digital in-memory computing power, deliver exceptional performance per watt for inference workloads, making them ideal for parallel processing of visual information. The two products, the Box PC BL74A and the CompactPCI card G506A, are now entering the test phase and will be available as standard products with embedded AI capabilities once certified.
One other to highlight is the recent announcement with the European Space Agency to bring its Metis inference acceleration platforms to space, supporting the ESA's mission to protect the planet, explore the universe, and strengthen European autonomy. The partnership will enable the ESA to leverage Axelera's sovereign technology and long-term availability to deliver high-performance and low-power AI capabilities in space, supporting missions that may last for years or even decades. This collaboration marks an exciting step forward in the intersection of AI and space exploration, empowering scientists to answer some of the universe's biggest mysteries.
We were also delighted to see Thales in France showcase what they are doing with Metis as they are working to keep humans in the loop of their AI solutions.
Democratization of AI with Axelera
Axelera AI has furthered its strategy to democratize artificial intelligence everywhere through a strategic partnership with Arduino, the global leader in open-source hardware and software. The collaboration combines Axelera AI's Metis AI Platform with Arduino's Portenta to provide customers with easy-to-use hardware and software solutions for AI innovation. This partnership enables users to dictate their own AI journey with tools that deliver high performance and usability at a fraction of the cost and power of other solutions available today. Arduino is one of the world’s largest sources of hardware and software for hardware and software developers. Arduino has a massive user base of over 30 million registered users worldwide. This community of innovators has created an astonishing 100,000+ projects on the Arduino platform, ranging from simple circuits to complex robotics, AI, and IoT devices. Additionally, Arduino has sold over 20 million boards, a testament to the platform's popularity and versatility. This partnership will truly democratize our technology.
Additionally, Axelera’s technology is now also available for purchase online. Yes, we opened our very own online store. What does a full-fledged Axelera customer experience look like? Well, customers can download our Voyager SDK and read SW docs. They can buy our boards and systems with one mouse click, and then get support and documentation while interacting with other developers right here on the Axelera AI Community. To date we have shipped to a dozen countries and are looking forward to hearing how these developers use their Metis systems!
Supporting Europe Technology Sovereignty
In addition to partnering with the EuroHPC and the DARE project, Axelera has been invited to participate in a number of incredibly important discussions to advance the European technology landscape. We are proud to participate and share our expertise with the governments of France through the AI Action Summit, the Netherlands at the State of Dutch Tech, and across Europe through the D9+. Most recently, I was honored and humbled to participate in the launch of the AI Continent Action Plan in Brussels.
It was a great discussion, full of valuable insights that make me genuinely optimistic about the future of European technology. A few key takeaways:
- With the first AI Factories already operational, and the launch of the AI Gigafactories call for interest, Europe is showing that when we work together, we can move fast and decisively.
- Across many parts of the AI value chain, Europe has players delivering cutting-edge solutions. With stronger collaboration and vertical integration — from hardware to applications — European AI can win in key sectors.
- European leaders increasingly recognize the importance of stimulating demand for “‘made in Europe” products, both in public procurement and beyond.
- Europe has plenty of capital. Now is the time to unleash it and direct it towards strategic sectors like AI and deep tech.
- The European defense market is becoming a strategic growth driver for our deep tech sector.
- Many EuroHPC Joint Undertaking (EuroHPC JU) centers are open to testing and deploying experimental European hardware and software solutions, helping our deep tech startups scale. They are also giving startups simplified access to their infrastructure, which is strategic to compete with well-funded overseas companies
- A true European single market is essential to build the first European trillion-euro company.
The combination of all of the discussions makes me incredibly excited. The current global turmoil has served as a wake-up call for Europe, and we are standing united to be successful.
Summary
In a recent all company meeting, I told all employees that ‘the best is yet to come’. As I look back on the past period, I'm pleased to say that we've successfully set up our chess pieces on the board. We've made strategic moves to position ourselves for success, and our team is now well-equipped to make the most of the opportunities ahead. Just as a chess player must carefully plan their opening moves to set themselves up for checkmate, we've taken the time to lay the groundwork for our future growth and success. With our pieces in place, we're now poised to make the moves that will take us to the next level.
It’s still day one, the best is yet to come!
