While Chinese game developers innovate tirelessly, the country’s semiconductor sector is experiencing a fervent race to go public, with chipmakers moving swiftly to secure IPOs.
Following announcements by Enflame Technology and Biren Technology about entering IPO guidance, Moore Threads made a significant step forward by reclassifying as a joint-stock company on October 28. Its registered capital surged from RMB 24.41 million (USD 3.4 million) to RMB 330 million (USD 46.2 million). On November 12, the company filed for IPO guidance with the Beijing Securities Regulatory Bureau, formally initiating the process for listing on the A-share market.
Moore Threads is a high-tech integrated circuit company specializing in GPU chip design. Often called the “Nvidia of China,” the company was founded in 2020 by Zhang Jianzhong, a seasoned tech leader who previously served as Nvidia’s global vice president and general manager for China. With deep expertise in GPU technology and product development, Zhang played a crucial role in Nvidia’s rapid growth in the Chinese market.
Since its inception, Moore Threads has raised tens of billions of RMB through six funding rounds, backed by major investors like Shenzhen Capital Group (SCGC), HongShan, ByteDance, Tencent Investment, and Zhongguancun Science City. Over the past four years, the company has launched three high-performance GPUs—Sudi, Chunxiao, and Quyuan—at a pace of nearly one per year, making it a standout player in China’s semiconductor sector.
Drawing inspiration from Nvidia’s model, Moore Threads has built a complete product line that spans chips, graphics cards, and clusters. It is the only Chinese GPU startup with a strong presence in both the B2B and B2C markets, earning its reputation as China’s closest equivalent to Nvidia.
Similar to Nvidia’s early success with gaming GPUs, Moore Threads initially gained recognition for its gaming graphics cards. Its flagship MTT S80 GPU has become a milestone, capable of running the highly anticipated Chinese game title Black Myth: Wukong. The MTT S80 also supports DirectX 12, making it the only Chinese-made GPU to achieve this level of compatibility.
Despite its achievements, Moore Threads faces challenges in catching up with global giants like Nvidia and AMD. While the MTT S80 supports Black Myth: Wukong, its performance in benchmark tests has exposed issues in compatibility, frame rates, and graphics quality. To address these concerns, the company released optimized drivers, boosting frame rates to about 50 FPS at high settings. Although this partially met player expectations, the company’s GPUs have humorously been dubbed “collectible gadgets” by the gaming community.
Gaming remains a foundational application for GPUs, but Moore Threads is expanding into other fields. Unlike Chinese chipmakers that focus on artificial intelligence chips, Moore Threads takes a broader approach, developing GPUs for general-purpose computing. The company aims to provide infrastructure for accelerated computing and comprehensive solutions for the digital transformation of various industries.
As AI evolves, GPUs are finding applications beyond gaming, including virtual reality and deep learning. According to Jon Peddie Research, the global GPU market is expected to exceed USD 98.5 billion by 2024, reflecting strong growth.
During the Global Unicorn Company Conference, Zhang said that GPU-driven AI technologies will remain a driving force in global tech innovation, deeply integrating into industries and unlocking new commercial opportunities.
With Moore Threads filing for IPO guidance, several listed companies have publicly acknowledged collaborations with the firm. In a market still dominated by Nvidia, AMD, and Intel (which recently expanded its focus on standalone GPUs), Moore Threads’ successful listing would represent a significant milestone for China’s GPU industry, further enhancing the country’s capabilities in advanced semiconductors.
KrASIA Connection features translated and adapted content that was originally published by 36Kr. This article was written by Feng Min for 36Kr.