Rockley Photonics raises $52m in first close of Series E investment round

Rockley Photonics of Pasadena, CA, USA (formed in 2013 to develop a silicon photonics platform for optical I/O in next-generation sensor systems and communications networks) has announced the first closure in its Series E funding round. Investors in the additional $52m funding include a key strategic partner, Morningside Technology Ventures, and numerous private investors. This latest funding round takes the total raised by Rockley to date to $165m.

“With this latest round of investment, Rockley is strengthening its position as a leading integrated silicon photonics solutions provider,” says chief financial officer Mahesh Karanth. “It will support the full execution of our business plan and continued growth as we make significant strides in co-packaging for optoASICs and data-center connectivity, LiDAR and consumer electronic applications.”

As silicon photonics transforms applications that were once the domain of traditional, pure electronic chip technologies, it is evolving into a core enabling technology for numerous burgeoning markets including Web 2.0 data centers, 5G, artificial intelligence (AI), autonomy, machine vision and healthcare, says Rockley. Market research firm Yole Développement estimates that the global market for silicon photonics is growing from $500m in 2018 to more than $3.5bn by 2025.

“Rockley is uniquely positioned, having developed a proprietary photonics platform and manufacturing technologies, underpinned by a depth of expertise that goes back some 30 years,” says CEO Andrew Rickman. “We are currently using our platform to address applications in the data-center and high-performance computing, medical and life sciences, and 3D imaging/sensing verticals with the potential for additional verticals in the future.”

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Tags: Silicon photonics

Visit: www.rockleyphotonics.com