GEORGE TOWN, Feb 19 — StarFive Technology, a leader in RISC-V technology and ecosystem development in China, will invest RM250 million over the next five years to set up its first design centre in Southeast Asia at GBS@Mayang, Penang.

Ong Chin Hu, vice-president and general manager of StarFive Technology Malaysia, said Penang was chosen as StarFive destination for expansion due to its talent availability and the state being the silicon valley with the most concentrated Integrated circuit (IC) design in Asia.

He said StarFive Technology was set up in Penang in May last year and the group will continue to expand its design centre as a world class innnovation hub in the next five years.

"Moving forward, StarFive Technology will invest an additional RM250 million for expansion over the next five years to create numerous high-value and high-income jobs and aspire to be a world class innovation centre,” he told reporters here today.

Ong said StarFive Technology has a complete and silicon-proven portfolio of RISC-V CPU IP series, platform-based software and hardware full stack System on Chip (SoC) solution.

He said StarFive Technology is committed to work together with government agencies and local universities to promote RISC-V open-source Instruction Set Architecture (ISA).

"More and more world leading semiconductor companies are joining the RISC-V community and StarFive Technology’s long-term vision is to promote and deliver a new level of open, extensible software and hardware platform on computing architecture for enabling green computing, green energy and smart city,” he said.

He said StarFive Technology is also planning to expand its market in this region in future.

Penang Chief Minister Chow Kon Yeow and Consul-General of China in Penang Lu Shiwei attended the investment announcement ceremony.

Chow said being one of the most vibrant states in Malaysia, Penang is dubbed as the talent magnet in the northern region as the state boasts a pool of talent that has expanded beyond mere processsing to include research, design and development — underpinned by the cumulative intelligence and specialised skills.

"We will continue to spearhead the development of a sustainable ecosystem, proven by our decades of industrial excellence and quality workforce, towards attracting more high-quality investors and reaching greater heights in time to come,” he said.

StarFive Technology, founded in 2018 and headquartered in Shanghai, has its products and solutions used in smart home appliances, smart monitoring, industrial robots, traffic management, intelligent logistics, wearable devices, solid-state storage, network communications, and edge computing. — Bernama