Corellium Inc., whose cloud platform makes it possible to create virtual versions of devices based on Arm Ltd. processors, has raised $25 million in new funding.

Announced on Thursday, the funding round was led by Paladin Capital Group. The venture capital arm of Cisco Systems Inc. and several other investors participated as well.

Software teams test their code before rolling it to production to ensure that everything works as intended. An Android developer, for example, would test a new app on an Android smartphone before releasing the app to customers. 

Using a physical smartphone to evaluate code is not always practical. The same applies in cases where developers are building software for other devices, such as servers or “internet of things” products. 

One factor that makes traditional software testing difficult is hardware cost. There are many kinds of smartphones with different hardware specifications. An app company seeking to ensure its software runs well on dozens of different smartphones would have to purchase one of each device for testing. Development speed is another factor: Setting up devices for a software testing initiative takes time and effort. 

Corellium’s answer to the challenge is creating virtual versions of devices in the cloud. The startup specializes in devices that are based on Arm silicon. Corellium enables developers to create virtual versions of Arm-powered handsets, internet of things systems and servers.

Corellium provides virtual Arm devices through a cloud platform. The platform is powered by a custom hypervisor running on Arm-based servers. 

The startup’s platform makes it possible to create virtual versions of, among other devices, iOS handsets. Apple Inc. filed a lawsuit against Corellium in 2019, accusing the startup of copyright infringement. Apple has since settled a part of the lawsuit and a federal judge ruled last December that Corellium made fair use of iOS code, but the iPhone maker is appealing the ruling. 

For developers, Corellium says, virtual devices can be a better alternative to not only physical devices but also emulators. An emulator is a program that creates a simulated version of a system in software. 

Emulators generate a less accurate version of devices than Corellium’s cloud platform, the startup says. The startup is also promising increased performance. According to Corellium, its platform can provide 10 times better performance than software-based emulators for app testing use cases at half the price.

Processing speed is an important factor in application development projects. If the virtual device in which programmers evaluate their code runs quickly, testing can be completed faster. 

Corellium says its platform is also useful for cybersecurity research. The startup provides tools that cybersecurity professionals can run its virtual devices to perform tasks such as analyzing network traffic.

More than 400 customers use Corellium’s platform, including multiple Fortune 500 companies. The startup says that it will use the new funding to speed up research and development initiatives in a bid to “support skyrocketing customer demand.” In parallel, Corellium intends to scale up go-to-market efforts, as well as boost its partner ecosystem.

In the long term, Corellium could benefit from the continued growth of the Arm ecosystem. Processors based on the British chip firm’s designs power billions of devices worldwide, including most smartphones and IoT products. In the public cloud, Amazon Web Services Inc. offers instances powered by custom Arm-based processors, while Microsoft Corp. is reportedly working on its own Arm-powered silicon.

As the number of Arm-powered devices continues to increase, so will the amount of code that developers for those devices. That could help drive more demand for products that make software development and related tasks such as testing easier. 

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