Horizon Robotics, a Beijing-based startup which designs artificial intelligence (AI) chips announced on Tuesday, 23rd December 2020, its intention to raise more than US$ 700 million in a Series C round. This decision was made to tap investors despite the Trump administration’s heightened clampdown on tech from China.
The company, which was valued at US$ 3 billion in its former round of fundraising in 2019, has already secured the first tranche of this Series C round at $150 million. Horizon had announced this information in a WeChat post.
The first tranche, (Series C1 round), was led jointly by 5Y Capital, an early-stage venture capital firm, Asia-focused private equity firm Hillhouse Capital’s Venture Capital unit GL Ventures and China-targeted Capital Today, an investor in e-commerce giant JD.com and food delivery platform Meituan. Other Participants in the round include Hong Kong-listed securities broker Guotai Junan International and KTB.
With this new investment, the startup intends to accelerate the development and commercialization of its automotive chips and driving solutions. It also plans to build an “open ecosystem” for its industry partners.
According to the firm, its OEM and Tier 1 auto partners include Audi, Bosch, Continental, SAIC Motor and BYD. It is to be noted that 75% of China’s ADAS-equipped (advanced driver-assistance system) cars along with Level 3 (autonomous driving under certain conditions) vehicles will be supported by Chinese suppliers by 2030, which will be a 20% increase from 2019 as predicted by investment bank CITIC Securities.
Trade Blacklist in the US
In the third week of December 2020, the US Commerce Department placed Chinese top chipmaker Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC) and drone manufacturer SZ DJI Technology, along with other over 60 Chinese firms to a trade blacklist that denies them access to US technology from software to the circuitry.
These banned companies have joined the likes of Huawei Technologies, and other Chinese AI firms like SenseTime, Megvii, CloudWalk Technology, and Intellifusion who had been blacklisted earlier by the US for their claimed complicity in human rights violations against Muslim minority groups in northwestern China’s Xinjiang region.
While Horizon was spared from this professed “Entity List,” at least for the time being, investors seem to be unchanged by Washington’s rising resentment to Chinese tech. Surprisingly, many Chinese AI companies have managed to close large scale investments this year.
About Horizon Robotics
The startup was founded by Annie Tao, Chang Huang, Kai Yu and Ming Yang. It is dedicated to giving integrated and open embedded Artificial Intelligence solutions with high performance, low power, and low cost. It was founded in 2012 and has its headquarters in Beijing, China.
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