Analysis
Samsung invests in picoChip
picoChip today announced that Samsung has made a strategic investment in the company. The amount of the investment is undisclosed, and forms part of the $27 million of new investment D-round announced in July by picoChip which was led Highland Capital Partners. The round has brought the total company funding to $70.5 million, placing picoChip in an unrivalled position to build upon the success it has already achieved in the wireless infrastucture market.
Sams“Samsung is a world leader in wireless infrastructure, and it is a testament to picoChip’s prominence as a silicon vendor for this market that Samsung has chosen to invest in us,” said Guillaume d'Eyssautier, president and CEO of picoChip. “The new round of funding reaffirms our leadership in multi-core DSP for advanced wireless markets with our WiMAX, HSPA and femtocell products.”
“Our strategic investment in picoChip represents Samsung's commitment to advanced wireless, said Brian Kang, principal investment manager at Samsung Ventures America. picoChip is a key player with leading edge solutions for both WiMAX and femtocells, and we are delighted to be working with them as we address these growing wireless markets.
Founded in 2000, picoChip has developed the world’s highest performance multi-core DSP, and is a supplier of complete femtocell, picocell and macrocell reference designs for WiMAX and HSPA. The company’s technology is being used by over a hundred manufacturers, including Tier 1s, in both WiMAX and 3G. picoChip femtocell customers include Axiom, ipAccess (supplying Thomson), Ubiquisys (supplying NEC and Motorola) and a number of other major OEMs and ODMs. Recently Google announced a strategic investment in Ubiquisys, who use picoChips’s HSPA femtocell product. In WiMAX, picoChip most recently won the Chip Design, Industry Innovation and Industry Choice Awards at the Best of WiMAX World Awards 2007, taking home 50% of the awards available. In addition picoChip was recently awarded a place on LIGHT READING’s prestigious “Top Ten Private Companies” list.