Tenstorrent raises $1.5B Series E at a $6.2B valuation
The AI chip startup, which TechTarget's headline casts as a challenger to Nvidia, closed a round led by Trace Capital and Innovation X. It follows a 2024 Series D at a $2 billion pre-money valuation.
Written by the CashIn AI newsroom from 9 linked sources and checked by a separate fact-check agent. How we work.
Tenstorrent, an AI chip company, said it has closed a $1.5 billion Series E funding round at a $6.2 billion post-money valuation, according to the company's announcement. Post-money valuation is what a company is worth immediately after the new money is counted. Series E is simply the company's fifth named funding round.
The round was led by Trace Capital and Innovation X. Bloomberg reported on Oct. 19 that Trace Capital is a firm started this year by Quiet Capital co-founder Ben Mahdavi. Bloomberg said Tenstorrent confirmed the news in a statement.
Who else invested
According to unite.ai, other participants, a mix of new and existing backers, include Agostinelli Group, ARK Invest, Brett Barna, Cadence Ventures, Eclipse, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Maverick Silicon, Morgan Stanley, Protagonist, Sandisk, T. Rowe Price, Tether Investments, Troluce Capital, Virtu Financial and XTX Markets.
How it compares with 2024
Unite.ai reported that the new round follows Tenstorrent's Series D, announced on Dec. 2, 2024. That round closed more than $693 million at a $2 billion pre-money valuation, meaning the value before the new money was added.
Some headlines say the valuation has doubled. The Economic Times' electronics site used that framing, and BigGo Finance said the round doubles the company's 2024 mark. The two figures are measured differently, one pre-money and one post-money, so treat the comparison loosely.
How outlets are framing it
We could read only the headlines of several other reports, so we take no details from them. Wowtale describes Tenstorrent as a RISC-V AI chip maker. RISC-V is an open instruction set, the basic command language a processor understands. TechTarget's headline says the company is out to challenge Nvidia in AI servers and chip IP, meaning licensed chip designs. Startup Fortune's headline says Tenstorrent turned down Intel and Qualcomm. We could not verify what that refers to.
The sources we could read do not say how the money will be spent or what Tenstorrent's revenue is.
Why it matters
A $1.5 billion round gives Tenstorrent substantial funding as it pursues the AI hardware market. Whether the company can win customers will depend on products and deployments, which none of these sources detail.
Sources
- RISC-V AI Chip Maker Tenstorrent Raises $1.5B Series E at $6.2B Valuation Wowtale
- Tenstorrent raises $1.5 billion, valuation doubles to $6.2 billion electronics.economictimes.indiatimes.com
- US AI chip startup Tenstorrent raises $1.5b to scale hardware Tech in Asia
- Tenstorrent raises $1.5B to challenge Nvidia in AI servers and chip IP TechTarget
- Tenstorrent turns down Intel and Qualcomm, raises $1.5 billion instead Startup Fortune
- Tenstorrent Announces a $1.5B Series E at a $6.2B valuation tenstorrent.com
- Chip Startup Tenstorrent Raises Funds at $6.2 Billion Value - Bloomberg bloomberg.com
- Tenstorrent Raises $1.5 Billion at $6.2 Billion Valuation, Doubling Its 2024 Mark — BigGo Finance finance.biggo.com
- Tenstorrent Raises $1.5B Series E at $6.2B Valuation to Scale AI Compute unite.ai
How this story was made
- Assignment
- Dozens of outlets are reporting the funding round, showing strong investor appetite for AI chip startups beyond Nvidia.
- Research
- 9 sources, plus a web search to confirm details
- Writing
- Staff writer agent (claude-sonnet-5-5)
- Fact-check
- Fix, confidence 90%, 2 claims corrected or removed
- Publishing
- Published automatically after passing the fact-check
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