Funding Opportunity
With the Pre-seed funding round of £170k, Wave have built and proven the core technology.
Wave are now seeking to raise £2.5m in Seed funding to build this into a product suitable for volume production.
£2.5m
Seed
Overview
Integrated photonics uses the same process used to make conventional semiconductor chips to make circuits for light. This makes it possible to take many light-based technologies from the lab and make them useful to humanity via the scalability of semiconductor processing.
The first technology to exploit silicon photonics at scale is datacentre transceivers (Intel, Cisco, HPW, II-VI etc.) – this proves it can be done and paves the road for frontier technologies based on silicon photonics such as chip-scale lidar, diagnostic sensors, consumer healthcare sensors, quantum technologies, (particle accelerators!), eye scanners, inertial sensors, and a whole host of other technologies.
Wave Photonics is creating a platform to take these technologies to volume production.
The Challenge
The journey from idea to product is difficult – years of design work go into making the fundamental building-block components required to put together a circuit. The existing libraries of components are minimal, sensitive to process variation and poorly optimised, and those that do exist only work for a few (telecoms) wavelengths, and so are not suitable for many other applications.
Even once this hurdle has been crossed and a circuit has been designed and verified, to turn a photonic circuit into a product requires packaging, laser integration, QA and frequently, additional processing steps such as coating, the inclusion of hybrid materials or microfluidics.
This comes together to mean that transformational technologies stay stuck in R&D.
The Solution
Wave Photonics is building a platform based on its core computational design technology which will enable designers to take products from idea to volume using pre-designed, adaptable components and integrations with packagers and other service providers.
This means they can immediately focus on their core differentiating technology.
Publications and Patents
- Patent writing on core approach in progress
- Patent application filed for application of technology to quantum secure communication
Management Team
James Lee | Chief Executive Officer
James undertook his PhD in Toshiba’s Quantum Information Group at Cambridge University where he developed photon sources for quantum computing, followed by a time modelling equity derivatives at an investment bank. He holds masters degrees in Photonic Systems Development from Cambridge University and Physics from Oxford University.
Matthew Anderson | Chief Scientific Officer
Matthew focuses on the photonic modelling aspects of Wave Photonics’ technology and on component design. He completed his PhD working in Toshiba’s Quantum Information Group at Cambridge University where he explored entangled photon sources at telecoms wavelengths for secure communication. He also holds a master’s degree in Physics from St. Andrews University.
Mateusz Kubica | CTO
Mateusz focuses on the computational optimisation and statistical modelling aspects of Wave Photonics. Before co-founding Wave Photonics, he worked for 9 years as an equity derivatives quant and quantitative developer at an investment bank where he helped build a Monte Carlo pricing engine. He holds a master’s in mathematics from University of Wrocław.
Ming Zhang | Non-Executive Director
Dr. Ming Zhang is most recently Distinguished Architect at Synopsys, driving semiconductor technology strategy and new market development. Prior to Synopsys, he was co-founder and CEO of a Silicon Valley chiplet startup, zGlue. His experience at Intel and at the Samsung foundry focused on manufacturing process/circuit modeling and robust chip design. He holds a Ph.D. in EE from UIUC and a B.S. in Physics from Peking University.
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