News Article
Achronix completes first close of $52 million series B preferred stock financing
The FPGA vendor completes one of the largest semiconductor venture financings in recent history, defying challenging market environment.
Achronix Semiconductor, provider of field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), announced the first closing of a $52 million series B preferred stock financing. The first $43 million of the unprecedented $52 million financing was closed on Oct. 10, with the remainder to close in the next several weeks. The proceeds from the financing will be used to fund the development of next generation products and to support the rapidly accelerating demand for the recently announced Speedster family of 1.5 GHz FPGAs.
Argonaut Private Equity led the financing, with the original group of Series A investors including Battery Ventures, New Science Ventures, Easton Capital Investment Group and Entrepia Ventures all participating significantly.
"The challenging macroeconomic environment has raised the bar for companies seeking financing of this magnitude," said Jason Martin, managing director at Argonaut Private Equity. "Achronix's disruptive FPGA technology packaged in a familiar design environment, a strong track record of execution and tremendous customer traction for Speedster all presented a compelling opportunity for us. With Speedster and a variety of exciting next generation products, Achronix is in a unique position to address the current and future demands of high performance ASIC and FPGA users," Martin added.
The Achronix Series B financing is one of the largest for a venture backed semiconductor company in recent history and occurs on the heels of the successful global launch of the Speedster family of FPGAs. Speedster FPGAs provide a three fold increase in performance compared to traditional FPGAs and are ideally suited for high performance applications typically dominated by ASICs, such as networking, telecommunications, test and measurement, and encryption.
“We are very pleased to welcome Argonaut Private Equity to our board and to have the continued strong support from our original investors,” said John Lofton Holt, Achronix co-founder, chairman and CEO. “Being armed with this large amount of capital allows us to focus on execution and making our customers successful. We are excited about the opportunity ahead of us and look forward to expanding the already strong Speedster market traction while building next generation products for our rapidly growing and demanding customer base,” Holt said.
Argonaut Private Equity led the financing, with the original group of Series A investors including Battery Ventures, New Science Ventures, Easton Capital Investment Group and Entrepia Ventures all participating significantly.
"The challenging macroeconomic environment has raised the bar for companies seeking financing of this magnitude," said Jason Martin, managing director at Argonaut Private Equity. "Achronix's disruptive FPGA technology packaged in a familiar design environment, a strong track record of execution and tremendous customer traction for Speedster all presented a compelling opportunity for us. With Speedster and a variety of exciting next generation products, Achronix is in a unique position to address the current and future demands of high performance ASIC and FPGA users," Martin added.
The Achronix Series B financing is one of the largest for a venture backed semiconductor company in recent history and occurs on the heels of the successful global launch of the Speedster family of FPGAs. Speedster FPGAs provide a three fold increase in performance compared to traditional FPGAs and are ideally suited for high performance applications typically dominated by ASICs, such as networking, telecommunications, test and measurement, and encryption.
“We are very pleased to welcome Argonaut Private Equity to our board and to have the continued strong support from our original investors,” said John Lofton Holt, Achronix co-founder, chairman and CEO. “Being armed with this large amount of capital allows us to focus on execution and making our customers successful. We are excited about the opportunity ahead of us and look forward to expanding the already strong Speedster market traction while building next generation products for our rapidly growing and demanding customer base,” Holt said.
