Compared with other mainstream chips, FPGA chips have high technical barriers and require a lot of R&D capital in the early stage.
Eagle chip (Chinese: 异格技术), a designer of domestic high-end FPGA chips, announced the completion of its Angel round with CNY 286 million. The proceeds are going to be used for product development.
Many famous investors participated in this round, including Matrix Partners China (Chinese: 经纬中国), Redpoint China Ventures (Chinese: 红点中国), Sequoia Capital China (Chinese: 红杉中国), CTC Capital (Chinese: 和利资本), and VLight Capital (Chinese: 光跃投资).
According to third-party statistics, the global FPGA chip industry was valued at around USD 6.86 billion in 2021, up 12.8% year on year, and the market is expected to reach USD 12.58 billion by 2025.
FPGA is a programmable device with unique advantages and wide applications in the fields of low-latency communication, high-speed parallel computing, video image processing, high-speed interface, IC verification, etc., especially in the construction of heterogeneous computing systems, where it holds a strategic position.
Established in January 2022, Eagle Chip focuses on the design of domestic high-end FPGA chips and EDA toolchains. The company's first product is to be 500K FPGA chips, with the hope to fill the gap in domestic high-end FPGAs. The company's core team has profound know-how of FPGA EDA software tools, rich experience in high-end FPGA new product design and the management and marketing ability required for enterprise development.
At present, the FPGA market is monopolized by international giants such as Xilinx and Intel (Altera). The market share of the two companies alone is 83%. Domestic FPGA vendors started rapid growth after 2010. Nowadays, domestic FPGA products that can be mass-produced are mainly logic chips of 100K and below. Mid- and high-end products account for a relatively small amount.
Other domestic FPGA players include PangoMicro (Chinese: 紫光同创), Anlogic (Chinese: 安路科技), and Gowin Semi (Chinese: 高云半导体).