NeuReality emerges from stealth with $8 million seed to set a new performance standard for AI compute infrastructure

Tel Aviv, Israel,  NeuReality, an Israeli startup developing high performance AI compute for cloud data centers and edge nodes, emerges from stealth today with $8 million in seed funding from Cardumen Capital, OurCrowd and Varana Capital to fuel the growth of real-life AI applications running at scale. NeuReality will introduce its first AI platform early this year.

NeuReality also announces the appointment of Dr. Naveen Rao, an AI industry expert, and former General Manager of Intel’s AI Products Group, to its Board of Directors.  Prior to his role at Intel, Dr. Rao had been the CEO of Nervana Systems (acquired by Intel in 2016).

NeuReality exponentially enhances ultra-scale inference for AI applications. Despite huge advances in deep learning acceleration, hyperscalers such as Facebook, Microsoft and Amazon are facing scalability challenges with recommendation systems, digital assistants (such as Alexa and Siri), language-based applications (such as translations and natural language processing) and computer vision use cases. Enterprises are facing the limits of today’s solutions and experiencing spiraling costs with their growing deep learning demands on-premises and in the cloud.

"Our mission is to deliver AI users best in class system performance while significantly reducing cost and power,” said Moshe Tanach, Founder and CEO of NeuReality. “We are already consuming huge amounts of AI in our day-to-day life and it will continue to grow exponentially over the next five years. In order to make AI accessible to every organization we must build affordable infrastructure that will allow innovators to deploy AI-based applications that cure diseases, improve public safety and enhance education. NeuReality's technology will support that growth while making the world smarter, cleaner and safer for everyone. The cost of the AI infrastructure and AIaaS will no longer be limiting factors.”

NeuReality was established in 2019 by CEO Moshe Tanach, VP Operations Tzvika Shmueli and VP VLSI Yossi Kasus. Prior to founding NeuReality, Tanach served in several executive roles as Director of Engineering at Marvell and Intel, and AVP R&D at DesignArt-Networks (later acquired by Qualcomm). Tzvika Shmueli served as VP of Backend at Mellanox Technologies and VP of Engineering at Habana Labs. Yossi Kasus served as Senior Director of Engineering at Mellanox and the head of VLSI at EZChip.

Gonzalo Martinez de Azagra, General Partner at Cardumen Capital and former head of Samsung Ventures in Israel commented: “The AI market is growing very rapidly and NeuReality will become the de facto standard in this segment. By focusing on the AI computing system as a whole, NeuReality will deliver AI computing infrastructure that is more powerful and more cost-efficient to meet the industry’s growing demands. We are proud to support NeuReality in its journey to make this a reality.”

One segment that will find NeuReality’s solution very relevant is healthcare, due to the growing scale challenges related to COVID-19 research and vaccine development. NeuReality enables customers to easily scale their AI utilization while significantly cutting costs, lowering energy consumption, and shrinking the overall computing-infrastructure footprint. 

“After seeing so many AI companies focusing on deep learning accelerators at the device level, NeuReality intrigued me with their refreshing view of overall AI deployment barriers and their unique system-level approach that will eclipse today’s outdated data center architecture,” said Dr. Naveen Rao. “NeuReality’s innovative design solves AI scalability and cost challenges.”

About NeuReality Ltd.: NeuReality is an AI technology innovation company creating a purpose-built AI-platforms for ultra-scalability of real-life AI applications. Founded in 2019 and led by a seasoned management team with extensive experience in data centers architecture, system, and software, NeuReality positioned itself as a pioneer in the deep learning and AI solutions market. NeuReality is headquartered in Caesarea, Israel. For more information visit www.neureality.ai.

About Cardumen Capital: Cardumen Capital is a venture capital firm founded in 2018 with offices in Tel Aviv and Madrid. Cardumen was founded by the former head of Samsung Ventures Israel and specializes in Israeli B2B deep tech Seed and Series A investments across various sectors including AI, Cybersecurity and Big Data. The fund is constantly seeking exceptional entrepreneurs and teams building deep and defensible technology enabled businesses. For more information visit www.cardumencapital.com.

About OurCrowd: OurCrowd is a global venture investment platform that empowers institutions and individuals to invest and engage in emerging companies. With $1.5 billion of committed funding, and investments in more than 240 portfolio companies and 25 venture funds, OurCrowd offers access to its membership of almost 69,000 individual accredited and institutional investors, family offices, and venture capital partners from over 195 countries to invest alongside, at the same terms. Rated by PitchBook as the most active venture investor in Israel, OurCrowd portfolio companies have been acquired by some of the most prestigious brands in the world, including Microsoft, Uber, Canon, Oracle, Nike, and Intel. To register, visit www.ourcrowd.com.

About Varana Capital: Founded in 2012, Varana Capital, LLC, invests in and cooperatively engages with small cap/early-stage public and private companies, primarily in the US and Israel. With offices in Colorado and Israel, VCLLC offers a variety of funds for accredited, long-term investors. For more information visit www.varanacapital.com.