The new AI story amid the sluggish stock market: the valuation of South Korean chip unicorn DeepX soars 4 times to $2.2 billion.

South Korean AI chip design company DeepX Co. recently completed a new round of financing, with its valuation surging nearly fourfold compared to the previous round, reflecting the sustained enthusiasm of the market for investment in companies related to the artificial intelligence industry chain. According to insiders, this startup, headquartered in Banpo, Gyeonggi-do, has a valuation of approximately 3.14 trillion won (about 2.2 billion USD) in the latest round of transactions. DeepX has signed the first agreements for its Series D financing, obtaining 42 billion won in funds from existing investors BNW Investment Co. and DS Asset Management Co. As a developer of semiconductor architectures customized for AI tasks, DeepX is currently negotiating additional financing, with plans to raise up to 300 billion won by September. Insiders state that the company aims for a post-financing valuation to reach as high as 3.5 trillion won after this round. DeepX's semiconductor products primarily target AI workloads and application scenarios outside of data centers, where power consumption and cost efficiency are crucial. The company has identified Siasun Robot & Automation and smart electronic devices as key deployment areas. The surge in valuation reflects the market's growing confidence in its commercialization capabilities. In April of this year, DeepX announced that it had secured over 30 mass production contracts from customers in eight countries. The background of DeepX's significant valuation increase coincides with a period of intense adjustment in the South Korean stock market. The market has long been heavily reliant on the two memory chip giants, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, and fluctuations in the semiconductor sector often have a significant impact on overall market sentiment. As there has been a phase adjustment in AI hardware transactions, the market is beginning to look for the next stage of AI growth direction. DeepX's rise aligns with the new trend of the AI industry expanding from cloud data centers to edge devices. The sharp increase in DeepX's valuation and the acceleration of mass production directly confirm the commercial explosive potential of "edge AI." This indicates that stocks related to edge computing, smart terminals, industrial automation, and Siasun Robot & Automation in the South Korean stock market will experience long-term sentiment recovery and value reassessment. The rise of fabless companies like DeepX, which focus on NPU/AI architecture design, showcases South Korea's capability to address weaknesses in its system-level chip sector, contributing to an overall enhancement of the valuation centrality of the South Korean semiconductor industry chain. DeepX is currently actively advancing preparations for an initial public offering (IPO). As DeepX and other AI chip unicorns like Rebellions accelerate their move to secondary markets, the South Korean stock market is about to welcome a wave of high-quality core AI asset supply. The valuation level of up to 2.2 billion USD in the primary market also establishes a higher valuation upper limit for similar sectors in the secondary market. DeepX's deep layout in the edge AI field has begun to benefit the downstream of the industry chain. Hyundai Motor has collaborated with DeepX to develop the Siasun Robot & Automation AI computing platform, while POSCO DX is applying its architecture in factory automation. Additionally, DeepX uses Samsung's advanced wafer fabrication technology, which will continuously benefit South Korea's local wafer fabrication ecosystem, semiconductor equipment, and OSAT (outsourced semiconductor assembly and testing) related entities.