Ayar Labs, a start-up based in Santa Clara, California closed $35 million in Series B financing for its in-package optical interconnect (I/O) solutions.
Ayar Labs said optical I/O (OIO) solves the major computing bottlenecks in interconnect bandwidth, power consumption, and reach. The company is developing a monolithic in-package optical I/O (MIPO) solution for applications that require high bandwidth, low latency and power-efficient short-reach interconnects. The company’s patented approach uses industry-standard silicon processing techniques to develop high speed, high density, low power optical-based interconnect “chiplets” and lasers to replace traditional electrical-based I/O. The company was founded in 2015.
Ayar Labs publicly demonstrated its monolithic electronic photonic TeraPHY chiplet at the Supercomputing 2019 conference and is now working with select semiconductor manufacturers, OEM systems builders, and end users.
The funding round was co-led by Downing Ventures and BlueSky Capital. New investors include Applied Ventures, LLC, Castor Ventures, Downing Ventures (U.K.), and SGInnovate (Singapore), expanding Ayar Labs’ investor base with strategic ecosystem and global investors. Existing investor participation includes BlueSky Capital, Founders Fund, GLOBALFOUNDRIES, Intel Capital, Lockheed Martin Ventures, and Playground Global.
“Over the last year, we have continued to invest and grow our organization, and have demonstrated a number of technology firsts while securing additional customer and ecosystem relationships,” said Charles Wuischpard, CEO of Ayar Labs. “The investment interest from new and existing strategic and financial investors despite these difficult global times allows us to continue executing our long-range plan for making Ayar Labs Optical I/O a ubiquitous computing solution.”
Ayar Labs selected for Intel’s DARPA PIPES Project
Ayar Labs has been selected as Intel’s optical I/O solution partner for their recently awarded DARPA PIPES (Photonics in Package for Extreme Scalability) project. The PIPES project aims to develop integrated optical I/O solutions co-packaged with next generation FPGA/CPU/GPU and accelerators in Multi-Chip Packages (MCP) to provide extreme data rates (input/output) at ultra-low power over much longer distances than supported by current technology….
Ayar raises $24m for TeraPHY chips, appoints CEO
Ayar Labs, a start-up based in Emeryville, California, raised $24 million in Series A funding for its work in silicon photonics for high-speed connectivity. Ayar Labs said it is pursuing a unique silicon photonics approach that uses fiber optic technology to move data between chips, rather than traditional copper pins and wires. It delivers improvements of 10x more bandwidth and 10x lower power compared to electrical interconnections. The funding…
