(Yicai) Sept. 25 -- Shares of Cambricon Technologies fell after the Chinese chipmaker said one more investor has reduced its stake in the company.

Cambricon [SHA: 688256] was trading down 2.6 percent at CNY127.12 (USD17.40) as of 11.25 a.m. in Shanghai today. The stock soared 357 percent to a record closing price of CNY249.50 on April 28 from the beginning of the year but has fallen 49 percent since then.

SDIC Shanghai Scientific and Technological Achievement Transformation Venture Capital Fund sold 7.4 million shares of Cambricon, equal to 1.85 percent of the total equity, between March 23 and June 29, cashing in nearly CNY1.5 billion (USD205.3 million), the Beijing-based chipmaker announced on Sept. 22. SDIC now holds only 1,176 shares of Cambricon.

Suzhou Industrial Park Paleozoic Venture Capital sold 4.3 million shares of Cambricon for CNY361 million (USD49.4 million) between Nov. 15, last year, and March 14, this year, and nearly 6 million shares for CNY1.1 billion between March 23 and Aug. 24.

The Nanjing and Hubei province branches of China Merchants Bank sold 3.1 million and 1.5 million shares of Cambricon for CNY388 million and CNY191 million, respectively, between Feb. 9 and June 7.

Venture capital firms are quickly selling their shares in Cambricon, likely because they doubt the company’s future business development.

Founded in 2019, Cambricon spent CNY3.9 billion of the CNY4.3 billion it received in direct investment in research and development. It reported losses of CNY1.6 billion, CNY1.1 billion, and CNY659 million in 2022, 2021, and 2020, respectively. In the first half of the year, its loss totaled CNY640 million.

Cambricon’s revenue rose 58 percent in the first half of 2021, 25 percent in the first six months of last year, but only 1.1 percent in 2022.

Cambricon shut down its automotive business department and carried out layoffs in the first half of the year. The business and personnel downsizing is related to external constraints and its strategic development, Yicai learned from several semiconductor industry insiders.

Editor: Futura Costaglione