A graphics processor in an AI data centre can draw several kilowatts of power — and the most wasteful stretch of that journey is the last inch: the step-down from the server board to the chip itself. Every conversion loses a little energy as heat, and in a warehouse full of accelerators, “a little” runs into millions of dollars. One Bengaluru startup decided to rethink that whole path, from the grid to the processor core — and two years after incorporation, a German chip giant bought the company to get its hands on the technology.
On 5 October 2026, Infineon Technologies announced it had completed its acquisition of C2i Semiconductors, a Bengaluru-based fabless chip company specialising in software-defined multiphase controllers and smart power stages for AI data-centre applications. The deal was first announced on 24 August with an expected close in the third quarter of calendar 2026, and its completion folds the C2i team into Infineon’s Power Systems division, per Infineon’s announcement. No financial terms were disclosed.
The problem C2i was built to solve
As AI workloads scale, power delivery has quietly become one of the binding constraints on data-centre design. Industry estimates put global data-centre electricity demand at roughly 1,000 TWh by 2030, with next-generation GPUs and AI accelerators projected to require peak currents of up to 6,000A before the decade ends. The NVIDIA H100 launched in 2022 at around 700W; future architectures are projected to demand as much as 4,500W per processor, per a TDK Ventures announcement. At those currents, losses in the final stages of voltage regulation are no longer rounding errors.
C2i’s answer is a software-defined voltage-regulator platform built on proprietary IP: the Manas Controller, a software-defined controller whose control architecture is designed to be agnostic to changes in the power delivery network and processor requirements, and the Sarayu Power Stage, a smart power stage the company says delivers better conversion efficiency with up to six times the reliability, alongside a modular scalability architecture that supports flexible phase counts for higher-current applications and vertical power delivery configurations, per the company. The company claims its platform can push power-conversion efficiency above 96%, against roughly 94% for incumbent solutions — a gap it says could translate to about $12 million in annual energy savings in a 100MW AI data centre, while keeping processors up to 4°C cooler, per the company’s projections. All of those figures are company projections, not measured customer results.
Silicon designed end-to-end in India
More Read
C2i was incorporated in June 2024 by six former Texas Instruments engineers and technologists: Ram Anant, Vikram Gakhar, Preetam Tadeparthy, Dattatreya Suryanarayana, Harsha S B and Muthusubramanian N V, reported Incubees. On 28 May 2026 the company announced the tape-out of its first smart power-stage chip for AI infrastructure — a design the company says was conceived, architected and verified entirely in India, reported PTI. A second product, a controller for managing multiple power stages, was planned for tape-out in October 2026 with sampling to customers in early 2027, reported StartupTalky — though neither company has confirmed whether that milestone was met.
The money behind it
C2i raised $15 million in February 2026 in a Series A led by Peak XV Partners, with participation from TDK Ventures and Yali Deeptech, and extended the round to $16.7 million in May 2026 in an oversubscribed extension that again saw TDK Ventures participate, reported Data Center Dynamics. It had previously raised $4 million from Yali Capital in November 2024. The company employed around 65 engineers in Bengaluru at the time of the funding announcements.
What Infineon wants with it
“Completing this acquisition marks an important milestone for our AI power business and our innovation activities in India,” said Adam White, President of Infineon’s Power Systems division. “C2i Semiconductors brings exceptional expertise in software-defined power management and system-level power architectures, backed by a highly experienced engineering team,” per Infineon’s release. Infineon says C2i’s expertise in digital power management, multiphase controllers and smart power stages complements its existing portfolio of silicon, silicon carbide and gallium nitride power semiconductors, and the combination is meant to create a new digital-power-technologies hub in India — where Infineon says it already employs approximately 2,800 people, reported TechNode Global.
The caveats that matter
Two calibrations are essential. First, the commercial test is still ahead: Infineon’s announcements disclose no purchase price, no acquired revenue, no named customer and no product-qualification or design-win milestones for C2i’s chips, reported TechNode Global. The acquisition confirms that a global power-semiconductor leader believes in the team’s technology; it does not establish that a C2i-designed component has entered production anywhere. Second, the efficiency and savings figures above are the company’s own projections from fundraising-era materials — credible engineering targets, but targets.
Why this one is worth watching
India’s chip ecosystem has historically been stronger on design services and verification than on original silicon products. C2i is one of the few Indian fabless startups to go from incorporation to tape-out of an AI-infrastructure chip entirely in-house — and one of even fewer to be acquired by a global semiconductor major for that technology. Whether the smart power stages and multiphase controllers now land in Infineon’s server power supplies and eventually in the AI racks of hyperscalers will decide if this deal was a bet on a team or the beginning of India’s first fabless power-electronics success story.
