Stuttgart, Germany-based Q.ANT GmbH, a photonic processor solutions company, today announced it raised €62 million, around $72.4 million, in early-stage funding to accelerate the commercialization of its energy-efficient light-based processors for artificial intelligence and high-performance computing.
The company’s Series A round was co-led by Cherry Ventures, UVC Partners and imec.xpand. Other investors also participating in the round included L-Bank, Verve Ventures, Grazia Equity, EXF Alpha of Venionaire Capital, LEA Partners, Onsight Ventures and TRUMPF.
Founded in 2018, Q.ANT develops photonic processors, which are a type of computing technology that uses light instead of electricity to perform computations. The company said that as AI infrastructure scales globally, traditional chip technology, which relies on transistors and electricity, is beginning to reach its physical limits, causing performance to stagnate. At the same time, electricity demand is restricting costs.
Over the past five years, the company said it developed its photonic chips for real-world AI and HPC workloads for integration into data centers. The chips, constructed from thin-film lithium niobate, enable servers to achieve up to 30 times greater energy efficiency, along with a performance improvement of up to 50 times.
Additionally, Q.ANT said its servers have the potential to increase data center capacity by as much as 100 times, all without requiring active cooling systems. If true, this could also reduce the amount of water needed for cooling vast amounts of processors and servers, allowing AI data centers to reach and exceed sustainability goals.
“Q.ANT was founded with a bold vision: to redefine the way the world computes by using light instead of electricity,” said Dr. Michael Förtsch (pictured), founder and chief executive of Q.ANT. “This investment proves that Europe has both the ambition and the capital to lead — and gives us the strong partners we need to pursue our mission and help shape the future of computing.”
Bob Sorensen, senior vice president for research and chief analyst at Hyperion Research, said the Q.ANT’s offering will be an innovative alternative for digital processors, providing an analog counterpart that can work on nonlinear math, particularly for AI inference, physics simulation and image analysis.
“Q.ANT is attacking two of the biggest challenges in photonic computing: integration and precision — while addressing the promise of computational and energy efficiency,” Sorensen added.
The company said that by 2030, it aims to make its photonic processing technology a foundational element of AI systems to enhance scalability and energy efficiency. In the meantime, it will use the new funding to work towards the commercialization of its product.
The company’s Photonic Native Processing Server is currently available for early access evaluation in an easy-to-deploy, industry-standard format that is compatible with modern programming languages — including C/C++ and Python — and AI software ecosystems.
Photo: Q.ANT
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