Intel to buy AI-based chipmaker Habana Labs

Intel to buy AI-based chipmaker Habana Labs

New York, December 5, 2019.

US tech giant Intel Corp. is in advanced talks to buy Israeli startup Habana Labs, a Caesarea-based chip manufacturer, for $1 billion to $2 billion, Calcalist reported Tuesday.

If the agreement goes through, it would be Intel’s second largest acquisition in Israel, Calcalist said. By 2017 Intel had already acquired Mobileye – a manufacturer of autonomous automotive technologies.

For Habana Labs, a manufacturer of processors and chips based on artificial intelligence, Intel Capital, the US company’s investment arm, invested in the startup last year as part of a $75 million Series B financing round. The Israeli company has collected about $120 million so far, according to the Start-Up Nation Central, which tracks Israel’s technology industry.

Habana Labs, founded in 2016 by David Dahan and Ran Halutz, uses artificial intelligence to improve chip processing performance and reduce costs and power consumption. The processors are designed to meet the specific training needs of deep neural networks.

The start-up’s first processor, Goya, is already being sold to customers around the world, and the company unveiled its Gaudi AI training processor solution in June of this year.

The company has offices in Tel Aviv and San Jose, California, Beijing, China, and Gdansk, Poland, and employs 150 people worldwide according to company data.