Morphotonics Raises €40M to Scale Nanoimprint Tools for AR and Data Centers
Morphotonics has secured €40 million to scale production of its nanoimprint lithography systems and expand into optical components for data centers. TechCrunch
The round was backed by 3M Ventures, Innovation Industries, BOM and Invest-NL, with participation from the European Innovation Council Fund, the Ernø Next Dutch family office and the European Investment Bank. The total is cumulative. Fundraising was structured as an extended round that began in 2024 and was raised in multiple installments.
That structure traces to September 2024, when the company announced a first closing of a $10+ million Series B. At that stage, 3M and BOM joined as new investors alongside existing investor Innovation Industries, and the company anticipated a second closing. The stated use at the time was to scale operations and supply chain and to expand the customer base, particularly in Asia. Company announcement
Morphotonics works in nanoimprint lithography, a manufacturing process that stamps nanoscale patterns into optical surfaces. It is used to make displays in AR glasses and other optics. The company spent 12 years developing the technology. It describes itself as a global leader in large-area nanoimprinting, with a platform of hardware, processes and proprietary materials that replicates features with sub-100 nm precision, or smaller than 100 nanometers, across large surfaces measuring in square meters at high throughput. Company site
Current applications center on smart glasses and advanced screens. For wearables, the target is affordable, high-performance nano-optics for AR and AI devices. For displays, the focus is large-scale manufacturing of microtextures for 3D and anti-glare layers.
The business remains hardware centric. Roughly 90% of revenue comes from hardware sales, with 10 to 15 systems deployed globally. Management expects to reach 50 system deployments in the next two to three years.
Hugo Da Silva joined as CEO in September 2024, when the company employed roughly 30 people. It has since more than doubled to 60 employees. Management expects headcount to stabilize around 70 to 75 people.
The next waveguide machine is now under construction. A waveguide is the thin optical part that guides light in AR glasses. The machine will be capable of producing more than 6 million waveguides per year. The company expects that system to start shipping early next year.
The data center effort is separate. Morphotonics is pushing into co-packaged optics, which places light-based connections close to chips, using photonic integrated circuits to move data between servers and network equipment. It has not shipped any machines for co-packaged optics. It says customers have validated the technology.
Morphotonics has teams in China, Taiwan, South Korea and the U.S.
The broader context here is that the €40 million figure matters less than two operational transitions. The first is the move from 10 to 15 installs toward 50, with a waveguide platform rated in millions of units per year. For diffractive optics, where yield and uniformity at volume have constrained AR glasses, that throughput will decide whether unit costs fall enough for consumer volumes. The second is use of the same imprint competence in co-packaged optics. In my view, that is the higher-risk move, since validation is not shipment, and datacenter interconnects impose different requirements for loss, alignment and reliability than display optics. If the imprint process transfers, Morphotonics would have a capital-efficient bridge between two demand pools. If not, the waveguide business still has to carry the plan.
