The foundation plans to use the $45 million funding toward further developing its hardware and boosting product marking. (Image Credit: Raspberry Pi)
Have you paid scalper prices for boards? I have. So, I’m glad to hear this news…
The UK-based organization behind the Raspberry Pi recently announced it secured a $45 million funding after demand increased for devices during the COVID-19 pandemic. Founder Eben Upton says that this investment into the Raspberry Pi Foundation’s trading arm values the operation at $500 million. The funding round was led by Lansdowne Partners and the Ezrah Charitable Trust.
The foundation plans on using the funds to continue developing and expanding its Pi microprocessors while boosting product marketing for the “built it yourself” PC and IoT sectors. Raspberry Pi was originally introduced as an affordable computer, lowering the entry-level barrier for computer education. Higher demand resulted in the Raspberry Pi board shortages rather than chip shortages.
“We are pleased to welcome Lansdowne Partners and The Ezrah Charitable Trust as our first outside shareholders to help us achieve the next steps in our growth,” said Upton in a statement. “We are seeing strong demand from consumers as they use our PCs to access the internet for work and entertainment, and even faster growth from industrial companies globally as they design Raspberry Pi into their innovative IoT applications. This funding will enable us to scale to meet future demand.
“Our new investors will not only add value to our strategy and help support our growth, but they also understand the rationale and ethos of our business model, aimed at enabling access to hardware and software tools for everyone and delivering a consumer PC experience from only $35 as well as building partnerships with a growing range of OEMs across the world.”
Raspberry Pi’s trading arm currently ships over seven million devices every year. At the same time, the foundation also ships over 42 million Pi-powered PCs around the world. Additionally, Raspberry Pi is the most dominant single-board computer for IoT industrial applications.
Have a story tip? Message me at: http://twitter.com/Cabe_Atwell
