OpenLight has closed a $34 million Series A round to scale its silicon photonics technology, aiming to enhance data transfer for AI and other industries.
Santa Barbara, California – OpenLight, a company developing advanced silicon photonics solutions, has successfully closed a $34 million Series A funding round. The investment was co-led by Xora Innovation and Capricorn Investment Group, bringing the company’s current valuation to $49 million. The new capital is earmarked to propel the company’s technology roadmap and support its commercial expansion plans, with backing from investors experienced in the semiconductor and photonics sectors.
The infusion of funds comes as industries heavily reliant on high-speed data processing, particularly artificial intelligence, are encountering the physical limitations of traditional copper-based interconnects in data centers.
Addressing Industry Bottlenecks
OpenLight aims to solve the growing data transfer bottleneck created by the massive processing demands of AI and other high-performance computing applications. According to Dr. Adam Carter, CEO of OpenLight, the company’s solutions address critical challenges in high-speed data communication. He explained that their silicon photonics technology, including specialized optical interconnects, facilitates much higher data transfer speeds, reaching up to 400G per lane. Dr. Carter noted that this approach also reduces latency and power consumption, contributing to more energy-efficient and sustainable data transmission for sectors like AI, autonomous driving, and quantum computing.
Leadership and Strategic Vision
At the helm of OpenLight is Dr. Adam Carter, an industry veteran with over 25 years of experience in semiconductor communications. His career includes a role as Chief Commercial Officer at Foxconn Optical Interconnects and executive leadership during the successful turnaround and subsequent $1.85 billion sale of Oclaro to Lumentum.
Dr. Carter stated that the primary motivation behind founding OpenLight was the market’s need for a more efficient, scalable, and integrated approach to silicon photonics. He elaborated that the company was established to overcome the limitations of copper wiring and enable a new class of photonic integrated circuits (PICs) that are faster and more power-efficient. The company’s leadership team also includes James Dixon as CFO and Dr. Volkan Kaman as VP of Engineering. The company highlighted its commitment to team diversity, noting that women constitute approximately 35% of its total workforce and 31% of its engineering team.
An Open and Integrated Technology Model
A core component of OpenLight‘s business model is its Process Design Kit (PDK), which has been validated at leading foundries like Tower Semiconductor. This kit allows customers to design and manufacture their own custom photonic application-specific integrated circuits (PASICs).
Dr. Carter added that this strategy makes the company’s technology more accessible, fostering broader industry adoption. He explained that the continuously updated PDK provides customers with a comprehensive library of tested photonic components and verified IP blocks. This empowers them to create highly customized PASICs, which in turn accelerates the design cycle and reduces the time required to bring innovative products to market. A key technological differentiator for the company is its ability to directly integrate key active photonic components, such as lasers, onto the silicon. This method improves reliability by eliminating the need for separate, external laser attachments.
Updated: 29 August 2025
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