Gemesys, which designs chips that mimic the behaviour of the human brain, has raised €8.6 million in pre-seed funding. The round was led by the Amadeus APEX Technology Fund (which invested in planqc and Vertus Energy) together with Atlantic Labs (which invested in tozero and Phlair) alongside participation from NRW.BANK, Sony Innovation Fund, and Silicon Valley-based Plug and Play Tech Center. It also saw grant funding from the German government.
What’s next for the AI chip startup?
With this new funding, Gemesys will accelerate research and development and double its current diverse team (five female members and five employees from various international backgrounds) of 19 to further advance its novel chip architecture. The company is now actively hiring for roles, including Senior C++ Developer and Senior Simulation Engineer, to build on its promising technological foundation.
Enables AI training possible on devices
Although neural networks mimic the human brain, they lack the efficiency of their biological counterparts. Training and operating these networks requires significant energy, a major challenge to creating genuine AI for mobile devices.
Founded by Dr. Dennis Michaelis, Dr. Enver Solan, Moritz Schmidt, and Daniel Krüger in 2021 as a spin-off from Ruhr-University Bochum in Germany, Gemesys is at the forefront of developing next-generation AI chips. It enables complete analog neural network processing, unlocking new possibilities for high-performance AI training and inference on devices, such as smartphones and hearing implants. This eliminates the need to transmit data to a data centre, which in turn minimises the energy used by traditional model training.
This approach reshapes Europe’s AI hardware landscape by addressing global technological demands with its revolutionary edge AI solutions. Gemesys pioneers on-device AI training through its chip architecture that combines data efficiency, energy savings, and enhanced privacy.
It develops next-generation AI chips with technology built on memristors that are novel electronic components that enable highly efficient neural network processing. Gemesys’ approach supports diverse applications like IoT, enabling outlier detection, data drift management, and personalised AI models, all with offline capabilities and minimal bandwidth usage.
Dr. Dennis Michaelis, CEO of Gemesys, commented, “At Gemesys, our mission is to bring learning capabilities to every device through technology developed in Europe. Building on this foundation, we’re pioneering new applications that empower edge devices like never before—positioning Europe as a leader in distributed intelligence and setting a new standard for industry innovation.”
Investors’ views
“Gemesys is reinventing AI hardware with a truly innovative approach to edge intelligence. Its technology isn’t just an incremental improvement—it’s a game-changer,” said Quentin Calleja from Atlantic Labs.
“Gemesys’ innovative architecture addresses the long-standing ‘von Neumann bottleneck’ while maintaining solid roots in CMOS technology essential for the supply chain. We’re thrilled to support the Gemesysteam as they pioneer a new era of energy-efficient computing,” said Antonio Avitabile, Managing Director – EMEA at Sony Ventures.
Ion Hauer of APEX Ventures expressed his support, said, “We’re excited to see Gemesys redefine what’s possible in Edge AI. Its technology can transform countless industries and push the boundaries of on-device inference and training.”
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