Ceva Reports Breakthrough Year for AI IP Licensing
Ceva, a licensor of silicon and software IP for edge devices, announced a breakthrough year, with ten new NeuPro NPU agreements. AI-related licensing now contributes over 20% of the company's annual revenue. This growth reflects a broader industry trend toward "physical AI," where intelligence is embedded directly into silicon for automotive, industrial, and consumer applications.
- One of the ten new agreements is a strategic deal with a leading global PC original equipment manufacturer, which will use Ceva's NeuPro NPUs in its next-generation on-device AI computing architecture. - Another significant partnership is a comprehensive portfolio license with Microchip Technology, which will integrate Ceva's NPUs across its product families to embed AI capabilities. - Ceva's NPU licenses in 2025 covered a wide range of applications, from ultra-low-power uses in consumer and industrial sectors to high-performance inference for PCs and automotive systems. Six of the customers from these agreements are anticipated to have silicon ready by the end of 2026. - The company is expanding its AI ecosystem through collaborations, including partnerships with Visionary.ai to enhance low-light video performance and ENOT.ai to develop an AI assistant for automotive safety features like pedestrian detection and lane departure warnings. - In the fourth quarter of 2025, Ceva achieved its highest quarterly revenue in company history at $31.3 million, a 7% increase year-over-year. For the full year, Ceva-powered devices shipped reached 2.1 billion units. - The term "physical AI" refers to the integration of AI into physical systems that can sense, reason, and interact with the real world, with applications in autonomous vehicles, robotics, and smart factories. - Other major players in the semiconductor industry are also focusing on "physical AI," with Arm Holdings recently creating a new business unit dedicated to this area, combining its automotive and robotics divisions.
