OpenLight Secures $34M in Series A Funding for Next-Gen Integrated Photonics in AI Data Centers

OpenLight, a leader in custom Photonic Application-Specific Integrated Circuit (PASIC) design, has raised $34 million in a Series A funding round. The funds will be used to expand its Process Design Kit (PDK) library, which is protected by over 360 patents and used by more than 20 companies. OpenLight plans to scale its team and develop standard-based reference PICs to meet the growing market need for efficient and fast optical interconnects in AI data centers.

OpenLight, a leading innovator in custom Photonic Application-Specific Integrated Circuit (PASIC) design, has successfully raised $34 million in a Series A funding round. The funding round was co-led by Xora Innovation and Capricorn Investment Group, with participation from other notable investors such as Mayfield, Juniper Networks (now part of HPE), Lam Capital, New Legacy Ventures, and K2 Access [1].

The funds will be utilized to expand OpenLight's Process Design Kit (PDK) library, which is protected by over 360 patents and is currently being used by more than 20 companies. The expanded PDK library will include advanced 400Gb/s modulators and indium phosphide heterogeneously integrated on-chip laser technology, as well as standard-based reference PICs at 1.6Tb/s and 3.2Tb/s [2].

OpenLight's PDK, which integrates passive and active components such as lasers, modulators, amplifiers, and detectors, has been validated at leading photonics foundry Tower Semiconductor. This validation ensures that the designs are production-ready from day one, simplifying advanced chip development and accelerating time-to-market [2].

With the new capital injection, OpenLight plans to scale its team and support customers as they transition to volume production over the next 12 months. The company aims to meet the growing market need for efficient and fast optical interconnects in AI data centers, as well as in other applications such as telecom, automotive, industrial sensing, IoT, healthcare, and quantum computing [2].

"As we enter this next phase of our company's growth, we are excited to be adding such strong investors with deep roots and expertise in the semiconductor and photonics industry," said Dr. Adam Carter, CEO of OpenLight. "With this strong syndicate of investors, we can push the boundaries of innovation and deliver transformative solutions to our customers. This funding will allow us to scale our operations, deepen our R&D efforts and bring our groundbreaking products to market faster. We believe heterogeneous integrated silicon photonics will transform the way data is processed and transmitted, and we're excited to be at the forefront of this revolution" [2].

The Series A funding round marks OpenLight's transition from a Synopsys subsidiary to a high-velocity, venture-backed company, positioned to address the growing demand for faster and more energy-efficient data movement in AI data center networks. The company's technology is emerging as a core enabler of next-generation data center infrastructure, as the shift from electrical to optical interconnects accelerates to support AI-scale workloads [2].

References:
[1] https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/openlight-raises-34m-series-a-to-scale-next-gen-integrated-photonics-for-ai-data-centers-302538310.html
[2] https://www.morningstar.com/news/pr-newswire/20250826sf58822/openlight-raises-34m-series-a-to-scale-next-gen-integrated-photonics-for-ai-data-centers