Lightelligence, a US-based photonic circuit chipmaker spun out from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), has raised $10m in a seed round led by internet company Baidu.
Baidu led the round through its corporate venturing subsidiary, Baidu Ventures, participating together with unnamed industry leaders.
Founded in September 2017, Lightelligence is developing computer chips that rely on light signals rather than electrical signals.
The approach could potentially result in significant increases in performance compared to current technology, making it particularly relevant for artificial intelligence applications.
The technology is based on research into nanophotonics, deep learning and optical computing at MIT. The spinout was established by MIT’s Technology Licensing Office, and was co-founded by Yichen Shen, who is also Lightelligence’s chief executive.
Shen co-authored a research paper into the technology with Nicholas Harris and nine others in scientific journal Nature Photonics in June 2017.
Harris and Shen later parted ways for unspecified reasons, with Harris securing $11m in a series A round for his own spinout, Lightmatter, yesterday.
– The original version of this article appeared on our sister site, Global University Venturing.