Biren Technology

Lore & Background

Biren was founded in 2019 by former tech employees including Zhang Wen, former president at SenseTime, and Jiao Guofang, a former employee at Huawei. It gained attention in 2022 by launching its BR100 chip, claiming performance comparable to NVIDIA's H100 processor. Their general-purpose GPU products are used in multiple intelligent computing centers including those from China Mobile and China Telecom.

Due to the losses following the US sanction in 2023, Xu Lingjie, one of its co-founders, left the company. On 2 January 2026, Biren held its initial public offering on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange to become a listed company.

As a result of US sanctions effective in October 2022 regarding exportation of advanced computing devices and manufacturing materials, Biren's contracted semiconductor manufacturer Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) halted all manufacturing of the company's products. In an apparent effort to get around a stipulation of the US sanctions, Biren reportedly modified its BR100 GPU to be able to process less data, so that it would not qualify for restriction for its manufacturer, TSMC. In October 2023, the United States Department of Commerce added Biren Technology to the Bureau of Industry and Security's Entity List.

Reader's Guide

Biren Technology's significance lies in its position as a Chinese fabless semiconductor company developing high-performance GPGPUs for AI and HPC, directly competing with industry leader NVIDIA. The company's BR100 chip, launched in 2022, was marketed as comparable to NVIDIA's H100, highlighting China's ambition in advanced computing. However, its trajectory has been heavily shaped by US sanctions: first in October 2022, which caused TSMC to halt manufacturing of Biren's products, and then in October 2023 when it was added to the Entity List. The company reportedly attempted to circumvent sanctions by modifying its BR100 GPU to process less data. Despite these challenges, Biren secured significant state-backed funding, including a 280 million USD pledge from Guangzhou government-backed investors after the 2022 sanctions, and 1.5 billion yuan from state-linked investors by June 2025. The departure of co-founder Xu Lingjie in 2023 following sanction-related losses, and the company's eventual IPO on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in January 2026, mark key moments in its history. Biren's story illustrates the intersection of Chinese tech ambition, US export controls, and the semiconductor industry's geopolitical tensions.

Did You Know?

• Biren was founded in 2019 by former employees of NVIDIA, Alibaba, and STMicroelectronics.
• The company's BR100 chip was claimed to have performance comparable to NVIDIA's H100 processor.
• Biren was added to the US Bureau of Industry and Security's Entity List in October 2023.
• The company held its IPO on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on 2 January 2026.