Etched fields funding offers at $40B+ valuation, sources say

据知情人士透露，AI 芯片初创公司 Etched 收到估值超 400 亿美元的融资邀约

Although it’s only been a couple of months since Etched raised $700 million at a $21 billion valuation, the AI chip startup is already being plied with investment offers at double or more its value, according to people familiar with the company. 尽管这家 AI 芯片初创公司 Etched 在两个月前才刚刚以 210 亿美元的估值完成了 7 亿美元的融资，但据知情人士透露，该公司目前已经收到了估值翻倍甚至更高的投资邀约。

Etched is reviewing incoming bids that range from $40 billion from top-tier investors to $50 billion from lesser-known backers, one person said. These fundraising talks are early, so terms of any deal, should one happen, may change. Etched declined to comment. 一位知情人士称，Etched 正在评估收到的报价，其中顶级投资者的报价为 400 亿美元，而一些知名度较低的投资方报价则高达 500 亿美元。这些融资谈判尚处于早期阶段，因此如果最终达成交易，条款仍可能发生变化。Etched 对此拒绝置评。

While this may seem like a fast timetable to raise another mega round, Etched is pursuing a particularly expensive segment of the AI industry: building full AI hardware systems powered by its own proprietary chips. The person familiar with these offers said that if it raises as much as its last round, this could give Etched a cushion of as much as 3.5 years of runway. 虽然这看起来像是进行新一轮巨额融资的节奏过快，但 Etched 正在深耕 AI 行业中一个极其烧钱的领域：构建由其自有芯片驱动的完整 AI 硬件系统。上述知情人士表示，如果此次融资额能达到上一轮的水平，将为 Etched 提供长达 3.5 年的资金缓冲期。

There are reasons why VCs are hot to own a piece of Etched. The four-year-old startup shows promise of challenging Nvidia. Not only did quant trading firm Jane Street lead the last $700 million round, it is also a customer that took delivery of an early system. 风险投资机构热衷于入股 Etched 是有原因的。这家成立四年的初创公司展现出了挑战英伟达（Nvidia）的潜力。量化交易公司 Jane Street 不仅领投了其上一轮 7 亿美元的融资，同时也是其客户，并已接收了该公司的早期系统。

Etched said in July that it had already secured $1 billion in customer orders, including the one from Jane Street, after manufacturing its test chip at a TSMC factory this summer. Co-founder and COO Robert Wachen previously told TechCrunch that investors are so enthusiastic because Etched has designed two new components from scratch to speed up inference — the computing process that happens after a user submits a prompt. Etched 在 7 月份表示，在今年夏天于台积电（TSMC）工厂生产出测试芯片后，公司已获得了 10 亿美元的客户订单，其中包括来自 Jane Street 的订单。联合创始人兼首席运营官 Robert Wachen 此前告诉 TechCrunch，投资者之所以如此热情，是因为 Etched 从零开始设计了两个新组件，旨在加速推理过程——即用户提交提示词后发生的计算过程。

The company claims its chips can process more tokens faster and at a lower cost than Nvidia’s. That’s the reason its processors have been so attractive to Jane Street, for whom a microscopic advantage in speed can yield massive profits. 该公司声称，其芯片处理 Token 的速度更快、成本更低，且优于英伟达的产品。这就是其处理器对 Jane Street 极具吸引力的原因，因为对于该公司而言，哪怕是微小的速度优势也能带来巨大的利润。

The startup has also impressed investors with its ability to attract engineers from Nvidia, with roughly 15% of Etched’s 400-person workforce having previously worked at the chip giant, according to The Wall Street Journal. Etched also operates a new 10-megawatt data center in Silicon Valley and established a facility in Taiwan to coordinate production near TSMC. 据《华尔街日报》报道，这家初创公司吸引英伟达工程师的能力也令投资者印象深刻，Etched 约 400 名员工中，约有 15% 曾在这家芯片巨头工作过。此外，Etched 还在硅谷运营着一个 10 兆瓦的新数据中心，并在台湾设立了设施，以便在台积电附近协调生产。

Co-founders Gavin Uberti and Chris Zhu famously met in an advanced math course at Harvard, while Wachen was Uberti’s roommate and they dropped out to pursue the company. In terms of fast rounds at big leaps in valuations, Etched already has a history of them. The startup announced a $300 million round at a $10.3 billion valuation led by Sequoia in July. It announced the $700 million round at a $21 billion valuation in September. 联合创始人 Gavin Uberti 和 Chris Zhu 在哈佛大学的一门高等数学课上相识，而 Wachen 是 Uberti 的室友，他们后来都退学共同创立了这家公司。在估值大幅跃升的快速融资方面，Etched 早有先例。该公司在 7 月宣布了由红杉资本领投的 3 亿美元融资，估值为 103 亿美元；并在 9 月宣布了估值为 210 亿美元的 7 亿美元融资。

Back-to-back funding rounds, which essentially act as a single financing split into two tranches with separate valuations, are increasingly common among the buzziest startups. 这种背靠背的融资轮次——本质上是将单次融资拆分为两个具有不同估值的阶段——在当下最热门的初创公司中正变得越来越普遍。