On October 28, Hangzhou Minna Core Electronic Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Minna Core) announced the completion of over 1 billion yuan in C2 round financing, led by Jiantou Investment, with participation from Hangzhou Capital, Kaitai Capital, Xiaochi Capital, Yantai Caijin, Guotou Taikang, and several other institutions, while multiple existing shareholders continued to increase their investments.
Minna Core stated that combined with the 1 billion yuan C1 round completed in September, the company raised over 2 billion yuan within two months, accumulating 3 billion yuan in financing over half a year. The valuation for this round was not disclosed, and the funds will primarily be used for product development iteration and supply chain mass production inventory preparation.
As financing continues to advance, Minna Core's first-generation three chips are in the transition stage from tape-out to customer verification. Minna Core was founded in 2021, incubated from the Zhejiang Provincial Peking University Information Technology Advanced Research Institute, and primarily develops compute-in-memory chips for artificial intelligence inference.
Traditional computing architectures require frequent data movement between processors and memory, resulting in bandwidth and energy consumption overhead. Compute-in-memory technology attempts to complete some computations within or near memory to reduce data movement. Minna Core adopts a self-developed 3D-CIM architecture that integrates DRAM three-dimensional near-memory computing, SRAM compute-in-memory, and RISC-V heterogeneous computing, with products targeting AI smartphones, AI PCs, and other edge devices, as well as cloud-side inference scenarios such as intelligent computing centers.
The company claims that its SRAM compute-in-memory architecture, in previous tape-out tests, can improve computing power density by 4 to 6 times and energy efficiency ratio by 5 to 10 times compared to traditional von Neumann architecture. Public materials do not provide complete comparison chip specifications and testing conditions.
Regarding product progress, Minna Core disclosed that the first-generation LP-CIM series and PCIe-CIM series, totaling three chips, have all been taped out and are expected to officially undergo customer testing and begin mass supply in early 2027. Prior to this, the company has conducted algorithm adaptation and solution development with multiple smartphone platforms, ODM manufacturers, and embodied intelligence enterprises, completing multiple rounds of simulator verification, with some projects entering deep joint debugging stages. On the cloud side, the company is advancing computing power solution evaluation and scenario-based POC testing with cloud service providers and AI infrastructure manufacturers. These efforts provide a foundation for subsequent customer introduction, but simulator verification, solution testing, and formal physical chip customer testing remain distinct stages.
Currently, the company has not disclosed named testing customers, bulk purchase orders, or revenue scale for the aforementioned three chips. In the compute-in-memory sector where Minna Core operates, some enterprises have already entered product mass production or large-scale shipment stages. Among them, Hourmo Intelligence has laid out related products with SRAM compute-in-memory technology, publicly disclosing in mid-October that its M30 and M50 chips have achieved mass production, with the M50 securing over 150 product design wins, and its first 3D-CIM chip A20 also put into production. Zhizun Technology has entered the low-power terminal market with Flash in-memory computing technology, with its official website disclosing cumulative chip shipments exceeding ten million units. On the cloud side, Yizhu Technology is developing compute-in-memory chips based on 3D DRAM technology, with related products having completed tape-out. On October 23, Yizhu Technology announced the completion of over 1 billion yuan in financing. The storage media, product positioning, and commercialization stages adopted by different enterprises are not entirely the same.
However, from the above progress, competition in compute-in-memory chips has extended from architectural design and laboratory performance metrics to customer introduction, mass production delivery, and actual shipments. Minna Core's financing lineup includes multiple industry chain enterprises. In September, Minna Core disclosed its C1 round financing information, with industrial investors such as Huaqin Technology and Megvii Technology participating. Both companies expressed intentions in Minna Core's financing announcement to collaborate around intelligent terminals, inference servers, AI smartphones, AI PCs, and other scenarios. Previously, Minna Core also disclosed investment support from storage industry chain enterprises such as GigaDevice and Biwin Storage. The participation of industrial capital helps the company connect with the storage supply chain and terminal application ecosystem, though currently disclosed information is insufficient to confirm that the above enterprises have placed chip orders with Minna Core.
For Minna Core, the 3 billion yuan in half-year financing provides financial support for chip research and development, supply chain preparation, and customer introduction, but assessing commercialization progress still requires judgment based on product delivery. According to the company's latest disclosed plan, early 2027 will be a key milestone. Whether this financing can support the company's transition from technology research and development to large-scale sales depends on the actual pace of the three chips completing formal customer testing, initiating mass supply, and the actual orders the company ultimately secures.
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