(Yicai) Sept. 4 — PhotonEra said it has secured over CNY1.5 billion (USD210 million) in a Series C financing round, which will help the Chinese photonic-electronic hybrid computing power provider strengthen its leading global market position.
New investors, including China Mobile, Shanghai State-Owned Capital Investment, China Reform Holdings Corporation Fund, and Shanghai Pudong Venture Capital, and existing shareholders such as CAS Star, Yijing Capital, and a leading internet firm, participated in the fundraiser, PhotonEra announced today.
“Large-scale photonic integration tech has entered a critical commercialization phase,” said Shen Yichen, founder and chief executive of PhotonEra. The share of photonic chips in smart computing centers will likely reach 30 percent within the next five years, Shen noted.
The latest financing round will accelerate PhotonEra’s core technology development and the large-scale application of photonic-electronic hybrid computing power, Shen pointed out.
PhotonEra has mastered the key tech of underlying optical and electrical chips and system integration, while having a forward-looking vision and outstanding engineering capabilities to transform cutting-edge tech into large-scale commercial solutions, China Mobile pointed out. The company will become a core driver of the next-generation computing power upgrade, as photonic-electronic integration architecture becomes critical in computing infrastructure, the mobile telecoms carrier added.
Established in 2017, Shanghai-based PhotonEra offers efficient computing power support in the era of artificial intelligence and big data, relying on its large-scale photonic integration tech. Its photonic computing and photonic networking services provide efficient computing power support to clients in big data, cloud computing, finance, autonomous driving, biomedicine, materials research, and other areas.
Editor: Martin Kadiev