A Reading-area chip-design company, founded in 2002, that designs complex custom chips (ASICs) for customers in areas such as cars, aerospace and security.
Sondrel designs custom chips, called ASICs (application-specific integrated circuits), for other companies. Instead of selling a chip off the shelf, it works with a customer to design a chip built for one job, such as the processing in a car's driver-assistance system or a security device. It describes itself as "a unique and trusted provider of high-quality, complex SoC designs across multiple end markets". An SoC, or system on chip, puts the main parts of a computer system on a single piece of silicon. Sondrel has also offered a turnkey service, where it manages the design, testing, manufacturing and packaging so the customer deals with one partner.
Graham Curren, an experienced electronics designer, founded the company in 2002 after seeing a gap between small design firms and big in-house teams: chips were getting so complex that many companies could not afford advanced design. The launch was hard, because it came just after the dotcom crash. Sondrel won a Queen's Award for Innovation in 2009 for its design methodology, became an ARM-approved design partner in 2016, and in 2017 took on the design team Imagination Technologies had called IMGWorks. In 2020 it completed its largest chip design to that date, with 30 billion transistors.
In the UK, Sondrel's headquarters is Sondrel House in Theale, near Reading in Berkshire; some sources describe the base simply as Reading. It also has design centres overseas, including in China, India and Morocco, plus other European and Israeli offices listed on its history page. A 2020 interview put its staff at more than 200 engineers. Mr Curren stepped down as chief executive in 2024 after nearly 23 years, with David Mitchard taking over as interim chief executive, and the company moved to leave the AIM stock market in 2024 and become private. We found no news after that, so check its current status before relying on this picture.
On culture, Mr Curren said in 2020 that he believed happy staff work better, and the company described flexible working hours and social committees that organised events, including online quiz nights during lockdown. It was already set up for remote working. The interview also says it looks for people who come up with ideas and challenge assumptions, and its history page says it believes in lifelong learning. These are the company's own statements.
Teams at a chip design house include architects, digital design engineers, verification engineers who test designs before they are made, physical design engineers who plan the layout of the chip, and project managers, plus supply-chain and sales staff for the turnkey side. Electronics, computer science and maths graduates are typical starting points. The company's website is the place to check for openings and for its current shape.
Website: www.sondrel.com
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