Artificial intelligence chipmaker Cerebras Systems announced on Friday that it is withdrawing plans for an initial public offering (IPO), just days after raising over $1 billion in a fundraising round.
In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Cerebras stated it does not intend to conduct the proposed offering “at this time,” though it did not provide a specific reason for the decision. A company spokesperson told CNBC that Cerebras still hopes to go public as soon as possible.
Cerebras initially filed for an IPO just over a year ago, as it prepared to compete with Nvidia by developing processors designed to run generative AI models. The IPO prospectus revealed a significant reliance on a single customer based in the United Arab Emirates—Microsoft-backed G42, which is also an investor in the company.
In the filing, Cerebras noted that it voluntarily notified the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) regarding the sale of shares to G42. In March, the company announced that CFIUS had provided clearance for the transaction.
Interestingly, the prospectus did not name top investment banks typically involved in leading IPOs as underwriters. Additionally, Cerebras’ auditor was BDO, which is not among the Big Four accounting firms.
Since its initial IPO filing, Cerebras has shifted focus from selling hardware systems to offering a cloud service that processes incoming queries to AI models running on its chips.
The decision to withdraw the IPO plans came just three days into a U.S. government shutdown that has left federal agencies, including the SEC, operating with limited staff. However, according to a shutdown contingency plan published by the SEC in August, the agency’s electronic filing system, EDGAR, would remain fully operational as long as its contractor funding was available.
Just days before the withdrawal announcement, Cerebras revealed it had raised $1.1 billion in a private funding round at a valuation of $8.1 billion. At that time, CEO Andrew Feldman expressed the company’s continued interest in going public, stating in an interview with CNBC, “I don’t think this is an indication of a preference for one or the other. I think we have tremendous opportunities in front of us, and I think it’s good practice, when you have enormous opportunities, not to let them fall by the wayside for lack of capital.”
A spokesperson later explained that Feldman felt the original IPO prospectus, filed last year, was outdated, particularly in light of rapid developments in the AI industry.
Technology companies have been aggressively expanding infrastructure to meet soaring demand. For example, on Tuesday, CoreWeave, a cloud service that rents Nvidia chips, announced a $14.2 billion agreement with Meta.
The company confirmed that the ongoing government shutdown did not influence its decision to withdraw the IPO at this time.
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/10/03/cerebras-withdraws-ipo-ai.html
