Irvine startup Axiom Microdevices Inc. is making headway in a bid to get its chips in cell phones after a rocky start in the past few years.
Axiom wrapped up a big round of funding in February, moved to larger space in July and hired a handful of executives locally and in Asia.
“It’s been a rocket ride this year,” Chief Executive Brett Butler said.
It also saw its chips, which help cell phones get better reception, go into mass production with a deal inked early in the year with Ningbo Bird Ltd., a Chinese cell phone maker.
Bird assembles Axiom’s chips into phones sold by Britain’s Vodafone Group PLC that are marketed to consumers in Asia, Europe and Australia, according to Butler.
Butler declined to give sales figures for Axiom. Vodafone phones make up the bulk of sales, he said.
“The Vodafone deal is one of the most successful phones that we have a product in,” he said. “I can tell you that we see it flying off the shelves in Europe.”
The company isn’t profitable but expects to reach that point “in the near future,” Butler said. It has about 40 workers in Irvine and a handful in China.
In February, the company closed a third round of funding worth $25 million, bringing its total raised to about $52 million.
For more on this story, see the Dec. 10 edition of the Business Journal.
