General Compute, an AI inference cloud startup, secured a $400 million loan from tech investment firm Upper90, reportedly the first deal to use inference-specific chips as collateral. The financing supports General Compute's strategy to build an inference neocloud around SambaNova's power-efficient SN50 chips, which the company claims provide 16 times faster inference than GPU-based clouds. This deal follows the CoreWeave model of chips-backed loans, with Upper90 now targeting companies providing cost-efficient inference for open-source models.
Capital is organizing to finance non-NVIDIA inference compute, validating alternative chip architectures and open-source AI models as a viable market segment.