Chip interconnect startup Eliyan Corp. today announced that it has secured $60 million in new funding from a group of prominent investors. 

Samsung Catalyst Fund and Tiger Global led the Series B round. They were joined by several other institutional backers, including Intel Capital and SK hynix Inc., one of the world’s largest memory chip manufacturers. The raise follows a $40 million Series A round that Eliyan closed in 2022.

“This investment reflects the confidence in our approach to integrating multichip architectures that address the critical challenges of high costs, low yield, power consumption, manufacturing complexity and size limitations,” said Eliyan co-founder and Chief Executive Officer Ramin Farjadrad.

Many of the most advanced processors on the market are based on a so-called chiplet architecture. A chiplet-based processor comprises multiple semiconductor modules that are produced separately, sometimes at different fabs, and assembled after manufacturing. Those modules are linked together into a single product using a component known as the interconnect.

Eliyan offers an interconnect called NuLink. Besides linking together chiplets into processors, the technology also lends itself to connecting processors with memory modules. Certain chips, most notably artificial intelligence accelerators, include a large amount of integrated memory they use to hold applications’ data.

The company says NuLink can provide up to four times the performance of competing technologies at half the cost. That allows chipmakers to design faster, more power-efficient processors. 

According to Eliyan, one contributor to NuLink’s speed is a feature called simultaneous bidirectional signaling. Many interconnects use tiny wires to link together chiplets. Typically, each such wire can only send or receive data at any given time but not both. Eliyan’s simultaneous bidirectional signaling feature allows each wire to send and receive data simultaneously, which effectively doubles its performance.

Besides boosting chip speeds, the company says NuLink can also ease processor development.

Interconnects are often implemented in the form of a so-called interposer. This is a flat, rectangular piece of silicon that both moves data between a processor’s chiplet and functions as the processor’s base layer. The chiplets are placed atop the interposer during manufacturing. 

Interposers enable fast data transfer speeds, but can be difficult to design and manufacture. According to Eliyan, its NuLink technology provides a simpler alternative that reduces the amount of effort to develop new processors. Moreover, the company says, its technology can also enhance interposer-based chips by “getting the absolute maximum performance” out of the onboard interconnect.

Eliyan’s latest funding round comes on the heels of a major technical milestone. The company disclosed today that it recently finalized a new iteration of NuLink based on Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.’s latest three-nanometer manufacturing process. According to the company, the upgraded interconnect can process up to 64 gigabits of data traffic per second per link.

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