This Surat-based Company is Creating AI Hardware for India
Starting a hardware company based in India is no easy task. However, Surat-based company, Vicharak, took on the herculean task of churning out hardware in-house, designed specifically for AI workloads. The company recently secured funding of INR 1 crore,  boosting its valuation to INR 100 crore. We’ve received ₹1 crore in funding at a ₹100 crore valuation. We’ve often heard that doing hardware is hard in a city like Surat or even in India. We’ve gone through hundreds of failed prototypes and iterations in our labs, but somebody has to start at some point, right?This…— Vicharak (@Vicharak_In) June 25, 2024 Speaking with AIM, founder and CEO Akshar Vastarpara said that Vicharak’s focus is not just on creating hardware, it’s redefining computing technology. “Our first target is to develop a GPU-like technology that can be used in mobile phones, laptops, and servers. We are approaching this in a very different way, starting with the consumer base but scaling to servers and lower-level areas as well,” Vastarpara explained. This led to the creation of Vaaman. It is a complete packaged computing board that boasts a six-core ARM CPU and an FPGA with 112,128 logic cells. Its distinctive design allows it to tackle challenges that existing products can’t. With a 300-MBps connection between the FPGA and CPU, Vaaman is optimised for hardware acceleration and excels in parallel computing. India for the World “Our goal is not to compete directly [with NVIDIA] but to offer something unique. FPGAs are reconfigurable chips, capable of doing many things that ASIC (Application-Specific Integrated Circuit) startups can’t. We can achieve 90% efficiency compared to what they offer,” Vastarpara said confidently. This is such an insane white pill moment for me. Back in college I used to such reviews by western YouTubers of western tech companies. Now time watching an Indian YouTuber make review about a deep tech product of an Indian company. We’re gonna make it folks. pic.twitter.com/RwkOcxMzmK— Varsh (@infinite_varsh) June 26, 2024 Vicharak’s products are poised to revolutionise single-board computing. “We are in the same industry as Raspberry Pi, but our boards include FPGAs alongside processors, offering a complete AI infrastructure,” he elaborated. Priced at $180, their boards offer a competitive edge with advanced capabilities at an affordable cost. Moreover, Vicharak aims to make its software completely free while maintaining proprietary IP on their hardware. “Our plan is to integrate FPGAs into every kind of computer, much like CPUs and GPUs today. The software we develop will be free, but the IP for our FPGA designs will remain ours,” Vastarpara clarified. Not just hardware, Vicharak is also in direct competition to NVIDIA’s CUDA with its focus on software. Its flagship product, Gati, exemplifies this vision. “Gati is our AI exploration project. We’re writing our own infrastructure on top of FPGA, creating a stack similar to what NVIDIA does with CUDA,” said Vastarpara. The goal is to enable AI inference on FPGAs, offering a flexible and powerful alternative to traditional GPUs and CPUs. Apart from Vaaman and Gati, Vicharak has also built Axon, a processor powered by Rockchip RK3588S, an 8-core 64-bit SoC, utilising a 8 nm lithography process. It also integrates a 4-core GPU and a built-in NPU which provides up to 6 TOPS of performance for AI workloads. Future Outlook Looking ahead, Vicharak aims to make its software completely free while maintaining proprietary IP on their hardware. “Our plan is to integrate FPGAs into every kind of computer, much like CPUs and GPUs today. The software we develop will be free for use, but the IP for our FPGA designs will remain ours,” Vastarpara clarified. Reflecting on his journey, Vastarpara shared, “I graduated as a software engineer in October 2016. While I could write software, I realised that my true passion lay in electronics and hardware. That’s how Vicharak was born.” Initially, Vastarpara focused on consultancy projects, which allowed him to bootstrap his company. “We grew a team of 30 people, and by 2022, we had shifted our focus entirely to consumer-facing products,” he added. Vicharak is already garnering interest from various sectors. “We are set to demo our product within two months, working with government contractors for smart traffic systems and robotics startups. We are nearing the launch stage and expect to see our technology in practical use soon,” he said.
Vaaman is poised to make a difference for developers and researchers in India, with affordable prices and easy availability, cutting down reliance on hardware from other countries.
Vicharak, took on the herculean task of churning out semiconductor chips in-house, designed specifically for AI workloads.
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Mohit writes about AI in simple, explainable, and often funny words. He's especially passionate about chatting with those building AI for Bharat, with the occasional detour into AGI.