South Korean AI semiconductor company FuriosaAI has raised $620 million (KRW 820 billion) in a Series D funding round, valuing the company at approximately $2.9 billion after the investment. The company plans to use the capital to expand production of its RNGD AI inference accelerators, strengthen its software ecosystem and advance its third-generation chip.
The funding comes as enterprises expand AI deployments and seek computing infrastructure capable of serving inference workloads at scale. FuriosaAI is positioning RNGD for commercial data center applications, where the cost and power requirements of running AI models have become important considerations for operators.
South Korea’s National Growth Fund invested $280 million, making it the largest investor in the round. International investors contributed a combined $110 million, while existing shareholders invested another $125 million.
FuriosaAI said it expects to produce 20,000 RNGD accelerators in 2026 and increase output to more than 40,000 units in 2027. The production targets reflect its plans to expand commercial deployments as customer demand grows.
Global Investors Back Commercial Expansion
U.S.-based investment firm Infinitum was the largest international investor in the round. Other overseas participants included Cisco Investments, Singapore-based QUDA Capital Partners, Abu Dhabi-based NeoFort Holding, and U.S. technology investment firms Jericho Capital and Worldline Capital.
QUDA Capital Partners founder and managing partner Charlie Foo previously held senior leadership positions at NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) and Mellanox Technologies, including serving as vice president and general manager for Asia Pacific enterprise business. He currently serves as a principal adviser to FuriosaAI.
The round also attracted additional Korean institutional capital. The Export-Import Bank of Korea selected FuriosaAI for its first direct investment in a startup. United Asset Management Company committed $30 million, making it the largest new domestic investor after the National Growth Fund. Hanwha Asset Management also participated.
Existing shareholders contributing fresh capital included Korea Development Bank (KDB), which invested an additional $22 million. FuriosaAI’s three original seed investors—NAVER, DSC Investment and KDB Capital—also participated.
NAVER’s initial investment came through its early-stage investment arm, NAVER D2SF, while its latest participation was made through NAVER Ventures, its Silicon Valley-based investment platform. DSC Investment, which first backed FuriosaAI in 2017, has participated in every financing round since the seed stage.
“We look for the moment a technology company moves from proving its technology to proving its business,” said Yong Jung Park, general partner of NAVER Ventures. He said FuriosaAI’s production and customer deployments had brought it to that stage, adding that NAVER Ventures would focus on supporting its expansion in North America.
RNGD Deployments Drive Production Plans
FuriosaAI’s fundraising follows commercial deployments of its RNGD accelerator at several enterprise customers.
LG Group is using RNGD for its EXAONE deployments, while AI company Upstage uses the accelerator to deliver live search summarization to millions of users. Samsung SDS launched a commercial neural processing unit-as-a-service offering based on RNGD in July, according to FuriosaAI.
These deployments give the company a commercial foundation as it increases manufacturing output and works to broaden adoption of its hardware and software.
“Taking an advanced AI chip from design to volume production is an exceptionally difficult undertaking, and few companies have demonstrated the ability to do so successfully,” said John Yetimoglu, chief investment officer at Infinitum. He cited FuriosaAI’s production deployments at Samsung SDS and LG Group as evidence of its commercial progress.
The company’s next challenge will be to meet its production targets while expanding its customer base and supporting deployments across different enterprise environments.
Funding to Advance Third-Generation Accelerator
FuriosaAI plans to direct part of the new funding toward developing its third-generation AI accelerator, referred to as Gen 3. The company has not disclosed detailed specifications or a launch timeline for the next-generation chip.
CEO and co-founder June Paik said the financing reflected investor confidence in the company’s technology and execution. He added that FuriosaAI intended to accelerate RNGD commercialization and develop its next-generation silicon for global AI infrastructure markets.
