December 21, 2021 -- Kneron, the San Diego-based full-stack AI company, today announces new funding of $25 million. The world-leading provider of smart life solutions, LITEON Technology, is investing as a strategic partner. Other investors in the round include Alltek, PalPilot, Sand Hill Angels, and Gaingels.
The funds will be used as part of strategic partnerships to advance the development of smart city technology, key to enabling L4 and L5 autonomous vehicles. Examples include roadside AI boxes which help direct and control autonomous vehicles, which themselves will be powered by Edge AI chips that Kneron already produces. Kneron’s reconfigurable technology allows its suite of chips to be used in a broad range of applications, meaning Kneron uniquely offers a comprehensive solution for the future of self-driving vehicles.
Albert Liu, Founder and CEO of Kneron, says: “The path to L4 and L5 is not just about the vehicle, but the entire technology ecosystem and infrastructure that governs and supports transportation. We’re excited to work with our new strategic partners on developing that infrastructure, advancing smart city technology in order to support transportation of the future. Kneron is the only company that enables autonomous driving from within the car and the infrastructure around it.”
Kneron announced its next-generation Edge AI chip, the KL530, at Web Summit in November. KL530 is a key solution for the AV and EV space, incorporating revolutionary technologies such as vision transformer AI models, INT4 data support, and a state of the art image signal processor. The inclusion of these technologies is crucial to enabling L4 and L5 capabilities in the car. KL530 can also be deployed in roadside units and other smart city devices to support vehicles, communicating effortlessly and efficiently for a holistic solution. This will lead to smarter, safer autonomous vehicles and ultimately faster adoption.
Anson Chiu, President of LITEON Technology, says: “We’re excited to work with Kneron to advance the technology needed to enable autonomous vehicle adoption on a mass scale. Kneron’s reconfigurable technology & industry-leading performance and efficiency make them the perfect strategic partner as we grow our suite of smart city devices, as well as advancing our smart manufacturing and IoT products.”
This funding brings Kneron’s total funding to date to over $125 million, following initial Series A funding from the likes of Horizons Ventures, Qualcomm, Alibaba, Sequoia and more. Earlier this year Kneron also announced strategic investment from Apple-manufacturer Foxconn for its MIH vehicle platform, Tesla supplier Delta Electronics, and more.
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