What if chip design didn’t take 3 years and $100M, but could be reimagined through AI? Today, I’m excited to welcome Cognichip Inc. to the world.
Backed by $33M in seed funding from Mayfield, Lux Capital, FPV Ventures, and Candou Ventures, Cognichip is pioneering Artificial Chip Intelligence (ACI®), the first physics-informed foundation model purpose-built for semiconductors.
Their mission: to make chip design faster, cheaper, and radically more accessible so that hardware innovation can finally move at the speed of AI. Think of it as an AI Teammate for chip engineers, one that helps solve complex problems, adapts to changes in real time, and eliminates bloated, expensive design cycles.
Why now? Traditional chip design is becoming unsustainable, both in cost and in talent. By 2030, the industry will face a shortage of 1 million skilled semiconductor engineers. ACI® fills that critical talent gap, enabling teams to move faster and more efficiently. This is the true promise of an AI Teammate: scaling innovation where human capacity alone can’t keep up.
We believe Cognichip’s ACI® isn’t just a step forward, it’s a new scaling factor for the semiconductor industry with these possible improvements:
– 75% reduction in development costs.
– 50% faster design cycles.
– More efficient, power-optimized chips.
As a firm that believes in Collaborative Intelligence, we’re proud to partner with Faraj Aalaei, a repeat founder and deep tech visionary, along with his world-class team of AI experts and semiconductor industry veterans, Ehsan Kamalinejad, Simon Sabato, Stelios Diamantidis and Mehdi Daneshpanah.
From idea to impact — this is what disruption looks like. Hear the origin story, the bold vision behind Cognichip, and the entrepreneurial journey that led Faraj to take on one of the toughest challenges in tech. Watch my conversation with Faraj here to hear why this matters, not just for chips, but for the future of AI itself.
