NovuMind

About NovuMind

NovuMind, Inc. operates as an artificial intelligence technology firm, concentrating on the development of specialized hardware and full-stack solutions for AI inference. The company was established in 2015 by Dr. Ren Wu and is headquartered in Santa Clara, California. Dr. Wu, the founder and CEO, brings a distinguished background to the company, having previously served as a Distinguished Scientist at Baidu and Chief Software Architect of Heterogeneous System Architecture at AMD. His expertise is rooted in using GPUs for big data analytics and his early work in AI, which includes creating a two-time world champion Chinese chess (Xiangqi) program.

The company's core business revolves around creating application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs) and supercomputing modules designed for training and executing AI algorithms, with a particular focus on AI inference for processing information like images and sound. NovuMind's business model encompasses selling its IP to chip providers, marketing chips to electronics integrators, and providing PCIe boards for data centers. This positions the company not just as a silicon vendor but as a partner in solution development. Clients range from those in consumer electronics and smart cities to healthcare and industrial automation. For instance, NovuMind's technology has been tested by NCS, a subsidiary of SingTel, for advanced video analytics in surveillance systems and in prototype 8K TVs for upscaling resolution.

NovuMind's product portfolio is built around its patented NovuTensor technology, which is designed to natively process 3D tensor computations on-chip. This approach is engineered to be more efficient for convolution-based deep neural networks by avoiding the need to break down 3D tensors into 2D matrices, a process required by many other chips. The product line includes the NovuTensor chip, an AI inference processor; NovuStar, a supercomputer for running multiple GPUs to train AI models; and NovuBrain, a combined ASIC and deep learning model solution for applications like facial recognition. The first-generation NovuTensor chip, fabricated on a 28nm process, received its first silicon product back from the foundry in September 2018. Since its inception, NovuMind has raised a total of $15.2 million over two funding rounds, with investors including Zhen Fund, Aplus Capital, and Inno Angel Fund.