Cavium

Cavium, Inc.

Company type	Public
Industry	Semiconductor
Founded	2000 (2000)
Founder	Syed B. Ali, M. Raghib Hussain
Defunct	July 6, 2018 (2018-07-06)
Fate	Acquired by Marvell Technology Group
Headquarters	San Jose , United States
Area served	Global
Products	ARM- and MIPS-based processors, system-on-chip (SoC) solutions for networking, video processing, security applications
Number of employees	850 (2011)

Cavium, Inc. was a semiconductor firm without its own fabrication facilities, headquartered in San Jose, California. The company specialized in developing ARM- and MIPS-based processors and system-on-chip (SoC) solutions tailored for networking, video processing, and security applications. Established in 2000 by Syed B. Ali and M. Raghib Hussain, its product lineup primarily served routers, switches, storage devices, appliances, and server markets.

The company pursued expansion largely through strategic acquisitions, growing its employee base from approximately 175 at the time of its May 2007 initial public offering to around 850 globally by 2011, including a workforce of 250 at its San Jose main office. Cavium competed within the semiconductor sector, focusing on products designed for networking infrastructure and security domains.

On July 6, 2018, Cavium was acquired by Marvell Technology Group, a move that significantly bolstered Marvell’s capabilities in CPUs, networking technologies, and security solutions.

Corporate renaming

Cavium Networks, Inc. officially changed its name to Cavium, Inc. on June 17, 2011.

Companies acquired by Cavium

Date	Acquired entity	Focus area
August 2008	Star Semiconductor	ARM-based SoC processors
December 2008	W&W Communications	Hardware and software for video compression
December 2009	MontaVista Software	Embedded systems software including Carrier Grade Linux
January 2011	Celestial Semiconductor	Digital media SoCs for satellite, cable, and Internet television
February 2011	Wavesat Telecommunications	Semiconductor products for carrier and mobile device sectors
July 2014	Xpliant, Inc.	Software Defined Networking (SDN) and switching technologies
June 2016	QLogic, Inc.	Solutions for Ethernet and storage networking

Cavium's acquisition

In November 2017, the board of Cavium approved a $6 billion cash-and-stock acquisition offer from Marvell Technology Group. This transaction was finalized on July 6, 2018, enabling Marvell to expand its market presence and broaden its product offerings.

NSA involvement

On March 23, 2022, a PhD dissertation on pervasive surveillance identified Cavium as an NSA "enabled" CPU vendor. This classification suggests that backdoors were embedded within the chip designs, raising significant questions regarding security integrity and corporate oversight.

Products

Cavium introduced its Nitrox line of security processors in 2001 to address needs in IPsec, SSL encryption, intrusion detection systems, and VPN technologies. The Octeon processor family followed in 2004 featuring a 64-bit MIPS architecture with multi-core options ranging from two up to sixteen cores; by 2012 this lineup expanded to support configurations with as many as 48 cores. In 2014, Cavium launched ThunderX—a server-grade SoC based on ARMv8 architecture with up to 48 cores—aimed at high-performance computing applications. Starting that same year, Cavium partnered with Xpliant to develop programmable Ethernet switches capable of delivering throughput up to 3.2 Tbps, enhancing its networking portfolio and reinforcing its competitive position worldwide.