Arm offers start-ups free access to chip designs

Arm offers startups that have raised up to $5 million in investments free access to many of its chip designs, such as Cortex A processor cores and Mali GPUs. About forty companies have already signed up for this.

These are start-ups in the chip field, Arm reports. Many of these focus on cars or internet-of-things, the company said. They can use the chip designs to design their own processors. It concerns Cortex A processors, Cortex M, Cortex R, various Mali GPUs and ISPs.

Companies are eligible for free access if they have received up to $5 million in funding. The access is intended for early stage start-ups. Presumably, Arm wants to attract start-ups in this way, so that they continue to use ARM architecture as they grow and then become paying customers. The British company can offer start-ups an alternative to an architecture such as risc-v, which can be used free of royalties.