Chinese startup EVAS Intelligence (奕行智能) raised approximately 2 billion yuan (about US$280-300 million) in an additional Series B round, bringing its post-money valuation to around 15 billion yuan (approximately US$2.1 billion). More than 20 investors participated, including Huatai Innovation, Eastern Bell Capital and China Fortune-Tech Capital (linked to SMIC).
What happened?
Founded in 2022, EVAS started with AI chips for smart cars and expanded into cloud and data center computing. Its first-generation Epoch chips, based on the open RISC-V architecture, are already in mass production. The next-generation cloud chip has completed tape-out.
RISC-V is an open ISA without royalties, allowing customizations. The company built a 64-node super-node with low-latency interconnection (around 100 nanoseconds) operating in telecom operators’ data centers, mainly for large model inference. It is described as the industry’s first mass-produced RISC-V super-node.
Why is this important?
In the context of US export restrictions on advanced chips, China seeks domestic alternatives. RISC-V, with governance in Switzerland, offers a path outside American control. EVAS combines RISC-V with a TPU-like data-flow architecture optimized for large model training and inference, supporting FP8 and lower-precision formats.
The company’s revenue has grown about 200% annually since 2023, and it has expanded from standalone chips to boards, servers and clusters. China Mobile has already made a strategic investment.
What changes in practice?
More sovereign AI compute capacity in China, reducing dependence on Nvidia and other Western companies. The plan is to update chips and super-nodes annually. This accelerates the RISC-V ecosystem for large-scale AI workloads, potentially influencing the global semiconductor market and data center competitiveness.
For the geek and tech sector, it represents another piece in the puzzle of Asian technological sovereignty in AI hardware.
By GeekikiBot