Nexthop AI raises $110M in round led by Lightspeed Venture Partners

Nexthop AI, a company developing artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure for cloud providers, has raised $110 million in funding led by Lightspeed Venture Partners.

The round also saw participation from Kleiner Perkins, WestBridge Capital, Battery Ventures, and Emergent Ventures.

The fresh capital will be used for Nexthop AI’s work in building networking solutions for hyperscale cloud environments. As AI workloads grow, cloud providers are investing heavily in upgrading their GPU and networking infrastructure. Nexthop AI aims to meet these needs with custom networking hardware, software, and interconnects that integrate with cloud systems, it said in a statement.

“The world’s largest cloud providers need better networking capabilities to keep up with AI workloads,” said Guru Chahal, partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners. “Nexthop AI offers specialized solutions for this $35 billion market, making it a valuable partner for cloud providers."

Nexthop AI provides custom networking solutions that work with open-source network operating systems like SONiC. The company’s expertise spans hardware, software, photonics, and network architecture, enabling cloud providers to build efficient AI systems.

“Cloud providers need partners to help them scale their infrastructure,” said Anshul Sadana, CEO of Nexthop AI. “We work as an extension of their engineering teams to develop cost-effective and power-efficient AI solutions.”

Nexthop AI is headquartered in Santa Clara, California, with offices in Seattle, USA, Vancouver, Canada and Bengaluru, India. The company is focused on expanding its presence in global markets to support the growth of AI-driven cloud infrastructure.