CRN rounds up 10 semiconductor startups developing silicon products, including AI chips and networking solutions, that either compete with Nvidia’s or complement them.
Nov. 26, 2025 –
As Nvidia demonstrated during its most recent earnings, demand for computer chips to fuel AI workloads remains voracious, even as critics continue to question whether the industry is nearing the peak of a dotcom-like bubble.
This is potentially good news for semiconductor startups who hope there will be enough room for them to grab a decent chunk over time of the AI infrastructure market, which Nvidia expects to reach up to $4 trillion by the end of the decade.
While some startups like Untether AI have come and gone, there are plenty of others who continue to raise hundreds of millions of dollars from investors and develop silicon products that either compete with Nvidia’s or complement them.
Direct competitors in the startup world include Axelera AI, which is focused on high-performance edge computing, as well as those who are focused on data center deployments, such as d-Matrix, FuriosaAI, NextSilicon and Rebellions.
A few of these startups—like NextSilicon, Tenstorrent and Tsavorite Scalable Intelligence—are not only developing rival AI chips but also general-purpose CPUs and, in some cases, other complementary technologies to deliver new paradigms in computing.
Then there is Cornelis Networks, which is building scale-out networking solutions to challenge Nvidia in this area, as well as Celestial AI, which is developing optical interconnect technology to enable seamless scale-up networking in AI data centers.
Xsight Labs, on the other hand, is looking to shake up data centers and edge environments with its high-bandwidth, low-latency DPU, server and Ethernet switch products for use cases that range from storage to security.
What follows are descriptions of CRN’s 10 hottest semiconductor startups of 2025, which include some of their biggest milestones from the past 12 months.