Among them, there are three Chinese companies in the invested company, namely Lexin, Ruiwei and Lingque Cloud.
Fabless semiconductor company Lexin Technology
It is understood that Lexin Technology is a global fabless semiconductor company with its business mainly focused on the Internet of Things. Lexin Technology official website said that the company provides a complete set of flexible solutions for Internet of Things applications, including WiFi chips. , Bluetooth chip and WiFi + Bluetooth combo chip.
This time, Intel Capital's C-round financing for Lexin was jointly led by Intel Capital and the Core Energy Investment Fund. This is another major step taken by Lexin after it received financing from Fosun Group B in September 2016.
LeXin launched core products in 2014 and 2016 respectively: ESP8266 chip and ESP32 chip, which became the industry's first Wi-Fi+ dual-mode Bluetooth/BLE+ dual-core 32-bit microcontroller (MCU) all-in-one system-on-chip (SoC) In 2016, Lexin was named "cool supplier" in the IoT field by Gartner.
Intel said that some of Lexin's chip solutions are widely used in tablet computers, cameras, wearables, and smart home devices and other Internet of Things products at a very competitive price.
Zhang Rui'an, founder and CEO of Lexin, said: “Lexin has developed a variety of wireless networking products and solutions for IoT after 10 years of development, relying on independent innovation to become one of the world's leading providers of IoT solutions. This time, the joint investment of Intel Capital and the Core Energy Investment Fund will further strengthen the company's development. Lexin's products are entering millions of households. We look forward to equip the world with more smart home devices equipped with Lexin's 'core'. '
Vision-aware products and solutions provider Rui Wei
Ruiwei is China's first artificial intelligence startup company. It not only possesses superior visual perception technology, but also is an advocate and leader in the front-end intelligence of the industry. It is committed to implementing complex front-ends in embedded front-ends with limited performance, power consumption and cost. Machine vision algorithms are applied in traditional industries such as home appliances, retail, and security to help the industry transform and upgrade and achieve AI empowerment.
As of now, Ruiwei has a total of four product lines, including security, smart retail, smart home appliances and car.
Take retailing as an example. Ruiwei currently has two hardware carriers. One is a store meter, which is used for precise analysis of customers entering the store; the other is Xiaoke, which analyzes the customer's attention to products and advertisements.
In order to solve the problems encountered in cloud analysis in retail, Rui Wei introduced a technology based on deep learning algorithm made by FPGA. While solving the problem, the cost was reduced to 1/3 to 1/4 at that time.
It is understood that this time, Intel Capital is a Swiss-funded B+ round of financing. This is a new round of financing completed in less than six months after completion of round B financing at the end of last year. This round of funding will be used to develop visual perception products. Application scenarios and industry solutions to accelerate the landing of AI technology.
Rui Zeng, founder and general manager of Zhan Donghui, stated: 'Artificial intelligence has risen to China's development strategy in China. This is a great opportunity for Ruiwei. This time Intel's investment has not only brought Ruiwei a broader platform for development, but also It will help Ruiwei to further expand its presence in the artificial intelligence industry and increase its market share, strengthen its industry-leading advantages, and accelerate the provision of richer application scenarios and better solutions. It will truly help industry customers achieve AI empowerment and value enhancement. '
Container PaaS Service Provider Cloud Cloud
LingQue Cloud was founded by the core founding team of the original Microsoft Azure cloud platform. It is a leading company in container services and enterprise-level PaaS in China. It has world-leading, ultra-large-scale enterprise cloud platform development, operation and maintenance and management experience, and is located in Seattle. Both Beijing and Beijing have R&D centers.
In June 2017, Lingqin Cloud released the SaaS version of Alauda Cloud and Alauda Cloud Pro, and then launched the PaaS platform for DevOps, the Alauda EE, for micro-service applications.
It is reported that the current customers of Lingqin Cloud have covered many Fortune 500 companies in the fields of finance, operators, manufacturing, energy, aviation, and automotive. The participants in this round of investment are all strategic investors, and funds will be used for professional team building. , The container PaaS platform is perfect and the industry is on the ground.
The financing was led by Intel Capital, and other strategic investors such as Mingzhao Capital were involved in the investment. Participating in this round of investment were all strategic investors. The funds will be used for professional team building, and the container PaaS platform will be perfected and the industry will be launched, further strengthening Lingqin Cloud. Advantages in the Chinese Container PaaS field. This is the new financing that Lingling Cloud completed within 6 months after it was led by Tencent Cloud Strategy in November 2017, and was funded by early investment party Gaochun Capital and broadband capital.
Zuo Yi, founder and CEO of Lingqin Cloud, stated that 'future containers will play an increasingly important role in IT technology. With the increasingly perfect ecological system, Container Cloud's PaaS technology has entered a mature stage. We are honored to have it. At the critical moment of the company's development, we obtained Intel's strategic investment. We will further temper our products and penetrate into the enterprise-class market. We will help enterprise customers quickly build cloud native applications and achieve DevOps landing through Kubernetes' container-based PaaS platform for microservice applications. This will accelerate business innovation iterations and ultimately achieve digital transformation.
Why Intel invests in them
Companies that are new to Intel’s portfolio will drive innovations that include: artificial intelligence (AI)-based conversational computing that accelerates the design of virtual assistants; improves user-perceived contextual experiences in stadiums, theme parks, hotels, and even hospitals Application; New processor that can bring machine learning capabilities to mobile devices.
Intel’s Senior Vice President and Intel Investment President Wendell Brooks said: “These new innovative companies have fully demonstrated Intel’s data-centric development strategy. They are shaping the future of artificial intelligence, the future of cloud computing, The future of networking and the future of chip technology. With the world increasingly intelligently interconnected, these technology areas will be crucial.
Lin Lizhong, vice president of Intel Capital and Managing Director of Asia Pacific and Europe, said: 'Intel Capital is committed to promoting data-driven technology innovation and supporting the transformation and upgrading of China's technology industry.'
Intel senior vice president and Intel investment president Wendell Brooks said: 'These innovative companies embody the strategic priorities of Intel as a data leader. They will help shape the future of artificial intelligence, the future of cloud computing, and the Internet of Things. The future, and the future of chip technology. As the world becomes more interconnected and intelligent, these are key areas of technology.
In addition, Intel Capital also announced that it has completed the diversified investment objectives set in 2015 two years and a half earlier - 'Invest 125 million US dollars to support women and ethnic minority-led startup companies'. Intel's investment diversification program aims to find Global companies founded and/or led by women and people with disabilities, and American companies founded and/or led by ethnic minorities, members of the LGBTQ community, and veterans.