NVIDIA CorporationPositron AI's $875M raise and Asimov ASIC explicitly aim to challenge NVIDIA's HBM inference lock with cheaper LPDDR5X-based inference.
Positron AI has raised $875 million in a combined Series C and Series C-1 round, valuing the Reno-based startup at $5 billion post-money. The financing, co-led by NEA, Andra Capital, Atreides Management, Valor Equity Partners, and SemiAnalysis Capital, represents a roughly five-fold markup from the company's February 2026 Series B valuation of just over $1 billion. The bet is that AI inference economics can be redesigned by replacing supply-constrained high-bandwidth memory with commodity LPDDR5X, the approach behind Positron's Asimov inference ASIC built on TSMC's N3P process. A single Asimov chip carries 288 GB of on-package LPDDR5X, expandable to 2.3 TB via CXL expansion, and Positron claims greater than 90% bandwidth utilization on transformer inference workloads versus less than 30% typically realized on NVIDIA GPUs. Asimov is scheduled for tapeout by the end of 2026, with production slated for the second half of 2027, meaning the chip will not be commercially available for at least twelve months.
NVIDIA CorporationPositron AI's $875M raise and Asimov ASIC explicitly aim to challenge NVIDIA's HBM inference lock with cheaper LPDDR5X-based inference.
Advanced Micro Devices Inc
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd.Positron's Asimov inference ASIC is built on TSMC's N3P process, adding foundry demand for the startup's chip.
Positron AI raised $875M in a Series C/C-1 round at a $5B post-money valuation, a roughly five-fold markup from its Series B.