Participate in the Challenge:
AI-NATIVE CHIP DESIGN

YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

Important: All information must be provided in English.

Salutation

Title

Last name

First name

Phone number

Your position (e.g. project manager, CEO)

Institution

Institution (other) (Enter your institution here, if it is not in the list above)

Legal Form

Legal Form (other) (Enter your legal form here, if it is not in the list above)

Address line 1

Address line 2

Postal Code

City

Country

Country (other) (Enter your country here, if it is not in the list above)

Where did you first learn that SPRIND or NADI exists?

Please specify where you heard about us.

What made you decide to actually apply to this Challenge?

Please specify why you decided to actually apply to this Challenge.

YOUR SOLUTION

Project Title

0/50

Short Description

0/500

RADICAL INNOVATION & VISION FOR AI-NATIVE CHIP DESIGN (MAX 1,500 CHARACTERS)

Explain the functional overall concept of your chip design process. Explain the envisioned end-to-end chip design process. How does AI transform the chip design process fundamentally?
What distinguishes your approach from existing EDA (Electronic Design Automation) tools? Why is this a radical leap rather than an incremental improvement?
How does your approach achieve the goal of reducing chip design development time from years to weeks?

0/1500

RADICAL INNOVATION & VISION FOR ADVANCED CHIPS FOR AI-WORKLOADS (MAX 1,500 CHARACTERS)

Which chip architecture concepts do you implement? What improvements in chip benchmarks do you expect? Have you already demonstrated these improvements?
What is your application area, what workloads do you initially focus on?
How does your approach achieve the goal of setting new benchmarks with regards to energy efficiency and compute performance? What Benchmarks are you aiming for within the scope of the challenge and beyond?

0/1500

EUROPEAN SOVEREIGNTY & FULL-STACK INTEGRATION (MAX 1,500 CHARACTERS)

How does your approach strengthen European technological sovereignty in the chip design ecosystem? What dependencies on non-European infrastructure, tools, or expertise remain?
Describe how your solution addresses the full stack: hardware architecture, software stack, and industrial application. Which layers are developed in-house, which rely on partners or third-party components?
How do you ensure foundry compatibility, e.g., TSMC, Intel Foundry, GlobalFoundries, from early development stages? What is your strategy for tape-out?

0/1500

TECHNICAL ARCHITECTURE OF AI-NATIVE DESIGN PROCESS (MAX. 1,500 CHARACTERS)

Describe the architecture and functionality of all key components of your Design process (e.g., AI core, design interface, verification pipeline, synthesis tools).
What is your abstraction layer architecture? How does your software stack interface with existing EDA tools, open-source frameworks, and proprietary design kits?

0/1500

CURRENT STATUS OF TECHNOLOGY (MAX 1,000 CHARACTERS)

What Technology Readiness Level (TRL) does your overall system and each subsystem currently meet? Please specify which components are operational, tested, or theoretical.
Does a prototype, proof of concept, or simulation exist demonstrating possible feasibility? If not, what is your validation roadmap for Stage 1?

0/1000

VALIDATION & BENCHMARKING (MAX 1,000 CHARACTERS)

Against which state-of-the-art reference systems have you validated your approach regarding both design flow efficiency and chip performance? What metrics demonstrate improvement?
What is your measurement strategy to detect design errors, constraint violations, or manufacturing incompatibilities early within your design process?
How will you test your chip design under industrially relevant conditions (complex designs, varying foundry requirements, reproducibility across design corners and PVT variations)?

0/1000

BUSINESS MODEL (MAX 1,500 CHARACTERS)

Who is your first target customer? Which segments of the semiconductor value chain do you address (fabless companies, IDMs, system OEMs, research institutions)?
Which benchmarks need to be met by your solution to be able to compete in your intended market segment?
Who are relevant competitors?
Have you received letters of intent, paid evaluations, or initial interest from potential customers? Please provide evidence.
What is your go-to-market strategy? How do you plan to overcome switching costs and integrate into established design flows?

0/1500

ECOSYSTEM INTEGRATION (MAX 500 CHARACTERS)

Which ecosystem partners along the value chain (foundries, EDA vendors, system integrators, research institutions) are you collaborating with or planning to collaborate with?

0/500

ECONOMIC RISKS (MAX 1,000 CHARACTERS)

What open risks do you see as the biggest challenge and how do you plan to mitigate them?

0/1000

WORK PLAN (MAX. 3,000 CHARACTERS)

Please provide a brief summary of your overall work plan. The detailed work plan, should be provided as a separate document and uploaded with the application.

DETAILS FOR THE WORK PLAN:

Present a work plan covering all two stages. How do your milestones align with the TRL progression required for chip design tools?
Detail the work packages for Stage 1. What objectives will you achieve? Where is collaboration or subcontracting required?
The plan should contain cost information, including possible contributions by the team (e.g., personnel, licenses, infrastructure), in detail for the first stage of the Challenge and provide an approximate budget for stage two.
Define measurable KPIs for technical progress (e.g., design completion time, error rate reduction) and commercial progress (e.g., partner commitments, revenue).

0/3000

PLEASE STATE YOUR FINANCIAL COST ESTIMATE FOR STAGE 1 (MAX. 100 CHARACTERS)

max €1,6 Mio.

0/100

YOUR TEAM (MAX. 2,000 CHARACTERS)

Why are you the best people to do this? Why is your team the best suited to achieve the goal of this Challenge?
What relevant field-specific expertise and experience do you already cover and through which team members?
Which critical competencies are you missing, and how will you fill those gaps? Which ecosystem gaps can you NOT fill with your current team or network?
Does your team have entrepreneurial experience or prior commercialization success? How will you access markets and customers?
Please attach the CVs of the key personnel.

0/2000

WHAT BEST DESCRIBES YOUR CURRENT LEGAL ENTITY STATUS? (SELECT ONE)

LEGAL STATUS (MAX. 800 CHARACTERS)

If you are an existing entity or in formation, please state your registered company name, jurisdiction, and incorporation date. If you are not yet formed, briefly describe your roadmap and target timeline to founding.

0/800

TEAM MEMBERS

For each Team Member add one row, indicating the following:

Name, role on the project (e.g., PI, Technical Lead, Research Engineer) and Percent FTE committed
Links to demonstrate track record (e.g., Industry, Entrepreneurship, Google-Scholar, GitHub-Project)

0/800

ATTACHMENTS

ATTACHMENTS

Mandatory Uploads:

CVs of key personnel
Detailed cost overview
Detailed Project plan, including list and details of Work packages and Milestones for Stage 1 and 2
Declaration on RUS Sanctions form (obligatory) – You can find the document here: German | English

File format: .PDF

Choose document (.PDF)

PRIVACY NOTICE - SPRIND GMBH

I/we declare that I/we agree to the processing of my/our data in accordance with the SPRIND GmbH (Next Frontier AI Challenge) privacy notice - dated April 2026.

Reasons for Exclusion

Declaration on Reasons for Exclusion

I/we agree with the statement on reasons for exclusion:YesNo

If No: The proof of self-cleaning according to § 125 GWB is enclosed with the offer.

Declaration of Infringements

I/we agree to require the above declaration also from subcontractors and to submit it to SPRIND upon request. YesNo

If No: proof of self-cleaning according to § 125 GWB must be enclosed with the offer.

SPAM PROTECTION

Please answer the following question to demonstrate that you are a human.

What is the third letter of the word future?

After successful form transmission, a confirmation will be displayed on screen. Feedback will be provided by December 10, 2026. Questions: challenge@sprind.org

Participate in the Challenge:AI-NATIVE CHIP DESIGN

YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

YOUR SOLUTION

ATTACHMENTS

PRIVACY NOTICE - SPRIND GMBH

Reasons for Exclusion

Declaration of Infringements

SPAM PROTECTION

Participate in the Challenge:
AI-NATIVE CHIP DESIGN