Crossbar, Inc.

Crossbar, Inc. is an American semiconductor company based in Santa Clara, California, focused on non-volatile resistive random-access memory (ReRAM) technology and, more recently, secure silicon systems. The company was founded in 2010 by George Minassian, Hagop Nazarian, and Wei Lu, and it licensed resistive RAM (RRAM) patents from the University of Michigan as part of that institution's Tech Transfer program. Crossbar has since filed numerous patents relating to the development, commercialization, and manufacturing of RRAM technology. Crossbar emerged from stealth mode in August 2013, announcing that it had developed a working memory array at a commercial semiconductor fabrication facility. The company claimed its technology offered faster write performance, lower power consumption, and greater endurance at roughly half the die size of NAND flash memory, while remaining CMOS-compatible so it could be fabricated without special equipment or materials. Crossbar's stated long-term goal was a terabyte of storage on a single RRAM integrated circuit, using a crosspoint array that stacks multiple silver-ion-based memory layers. The company has raised venture funding from investors including Artiman Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Northern Light Venture Capital, and the Michigan Investment in New Technology Startups (MINTS) program, with a $25 million round in 2012 and a further round of about $35 million announced in September 2015 with investors from China and Hong Kong. Crossbar primarily markets to original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and system-on-a-chip (SoC) developers serving consumer, enterprise, mobile, industrial, and Internet of Things products. More recently, Crossbar has positioned its ReRAM technology as a foundation for secure hardware, highlighting features such as tamper-resistant key storage, high density, energy efficiency, and high performance. Its current flagship offering is the Daric Secure Processing Unit (SPU), which combines compute, cryptographic acceleration, and ReRAM-based memory into a single monolithic architecture. Crossbar also promotes open-source hardware wallets and MPC-based seedless key management built on its secure element technology.

Crossbar was founded in 2010 by George Minassian, Hagop Nazarian, and Wei Lu. As part of the University of Michigan Tech Transfer program, the company licensed resistive RAM (RRAM) patents from the University of Michigan in the same year. Crossbar subsequently filed patents relating to the development, commercialization, and manufacturing of RRAM technology. In 2012, Crossbar received $25 million in funding from Artiman Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Northern Light Venture Capital, and the Michigan Investment in New Technology Startups (MINTS) program. In August 2013, the company emerged from stealth mode and announced the development of a memory array at a commercial semiconductor device fabrication facility. Crossbar stated that the technology would deliver faster write performance, lower power consumption, and more endurance at half the die size compared to NAND flash memory. Because the technology is CMOS-compatible, it can be fabricated without special equipment or materials. In 2013, Crossbar announced its goal of achieving a terabyte of storage on a single RRAM integrated circuit, compatible with standard CMOS semiconductor manufacturing processes. A prototype showcased that year had the theoretical ability to achieve this on a 200mm² chip. According to Crossbar, the chip uses a crosspoint array to stack multiple silver-ion-based memory layers on top of each other, with the prototype having three such layers. Another funding round of about $35 million was announced in September 2015, with investors from China and Hong Kong. Crossbar primarily markets to original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and system-on-a-chip (SoC) developers of consumer, enterprise, mobile, industrial, and Internet of Things products. More recently, Crossbar has expanded its focus toward secure silicon systems. Its official website describes ReRAM as purpose-built memory and silicon architectures engineered for performance, security, and hardware-level verifiability. The company highlights over 200 patents worldwide, a 22nm ReRAM process node, 150-year data retention, and 100% open source. Its flagship security chip, the Daric SPU, combines compute, cryptographic acceleration, and ReRAM-based memory into a single monolithic architecture. Crossbar also promotes open-source hardware wallets and MPC-based seedless key management on a secure element.

• 2015

  Announces another funding round of about $35 million with investors from China and Hong Kong.

• 2013

  Emerges from stealth mode and announces development of a memory array at a commercial fabrication facility; announces goal of terabyte storage on a single RRAM IC.

• 2012

  Receives $25 million in funding from Artiman Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Northern Light Venture Capital, and MINTS.

• 2010

  Crossbar founded by George Minassian, Hagop Nazarian, and Wei Lu; licenses RRAM patents from the University of Michigan.

Developer of non-volatile ReRAM memory and secure silicon architectures for OEMs and SoC developers, emphasizing performance, security, and hardware-level verifiability.

• ReRAM memory arrays

  Non-volatile resistive random-access memory using a crosspoint array to stack multiple silver-ion-based memory layers.

• Daric SPU

  Crossbar's purpose-built secure processing unit combining compute, cryptographic acceleration, and ReRAM-based memory into a single monolithic architecture.

• Hardware wallets

  Open-source hardware wallets from chip RTL to application layer, with IRIS-inspectable silicon and verifiable firmware.

• MPC seedless key management

  Seedless key management on a secure element, claimed to be 10x faster than cloud-based MPC with local threshold signing and no cloud dependency.

1. 1CrossBar – CrossBar, Inc.crossbar-inc.com
2. 2Crossbar, Inc. - Wikipediaen.wikipedia.org
3. 3Crossbar - Wikidatawikidata.org