AUGUST 18 2008 -- Nanotech Semiconductor Ltd. (search for Nanotech Semiconductor), a fabless IC company specializing in advanced analog and mixed-signal ICs for fiber-optic communications, has announced the completion of a $5 million funding round.
Existing venture-capital investors Pond Venture Partners and Atlantic Bridge, together with CEO and founder Gary Steele, contributed to the round, which brings total investor funding to more than $15 million. The funding is targeted towards new opportunities at multi-gigabit rates to be designed and manufactured in advanced pure-CMOS technologies.
According to Steele, "In the last 12 months production has ramped steeply, with 5 million ICs already shipped, and the 10 million marker likely to be breached by year end. We have significant traction in both plastic optical fiber and glass optical fiber markets, and with the best performing products at CMOS prices, we are achieving 40 to 50% market share in some cases. Nevertheless opportunities still abound, especially in the multi-gigabit space. In many areas, copper links are becoming increasingly restrictive and power-hungry. In other areas, we see cost reductions can be achieved by replacing expensive SiGe-based solutions. We therefore made the case to our investors that we should accelerate our investments in the multi-gigabit space, and that case was readily accepted."
Richard Irving, managing partner of Pond Venture Partners and board director at Nanotech, added, "Nanotech has a fantastic track record of transistor-level and architectural innovations in CMOS, and we were very excited to see yet more innovations coming in the 2.5- to 10-Gbit space. Both existing and up-and-coming markets are ripe for these innovations, and there was no question in our minds they should be exploited as quickly as possible."
Brian Long, managing partner of Atlantic Bridge and board director at Nanotech, commented, "Clearly with the rising cost of energy, innovations offering significantly reduced power consumption are increasingly attractive. As consumer communications links reach multi-gigabit speeds, optical fiber solutions, with low-cost, low-power CMOS ICs, offer compelling advantages over traditional copper-based links. In the next year to 18 months we expect to see the kind of inflection point with fiber-based communications that investors look for.'
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