UK chipmaker Fractile in talks to raise $600 million at $6.5 billion valuation

en.Wedoany.com Reported - UK-based AI chip developer Fractile is in advanced talks for its latest funding round, targeting a pre-money valuation of $6.5 billion. According to sources familiar with the matter, the company is expected to raise approximately $600 million, with some funds already invested at a lower valuation. The round is co-led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Redpoint Ventures, with Thrive Capital and Founders Fund also serving as co-lead investors.

The sources added that Fractile recently reached a preliminary agreement to supply AI company Anthropic with chips worth approximately $250 million, with plans to expand the contract scale in the future. These chips are not expected to be operational until 2027.

Fractile was founded in 2022 by Walter Goodwin, a robotics expert from the University of Oxford, and focuses on developing systems that improve the efficiency of AI model inference, accelerating answer generation and solving complex problems. The company claims its technology can be applied beyond chatbots, including in AI-driven drug and materials discovery.

In May of this year, Fractile completed a $220 million funding round led by Founders Fund, Accel, and Factorial Funds, with participation from Gigascale, Buckley Ventures, Conviction, 8VC, O1A, Felicis, and other existing investors. This funding is expected to support the accelerated development and launch of Fractile's first chips and systems, as well as expand its teams in the UK, the US, and Taiwan.

In February of this year, the company announced plans to invest £100 million in its UK operations over three years to expand its offices in London and Bristol and establish a new hardware engineering center in Bristol. Fractile stated that this investment aligns with the government's broader initiative to position the UK as a hub for AI and data infrastructure.