Our world is filling with digital devices that need to communicate with each other, and modern lifestyles mean people want to receive more data via the internet. Modulators, which convert electrical signals into the light signals necessary to cross the world in fiber optic cables, are an essential part of our communication infrastructure.

ETH Zurich Pioneer Fellow Claudia Hoessbacher and co-founders Wolfgang Heni and Benedikt Bäuerle uses shorter-wavelength plasmonics, instead of normal light, to shrink these components to nanoscale, while providing unprecedented speeds of data transmission and reducing its energy consumption. Polariton’s modulators transmit at up to 500 GHz, 10-times faster than the prevailing photonic modulator technology. 

Polariton used Venture Kick pre-seed funding to validated business assumptions and meet potential customer and suppliers worldwide. The team recently demonstrated its nano technology – the culmination of six years research – to international key opinion leaders and gained its fourth team member. The Zurich-based startup has initiated contact with investors as it looks to raise a $1-2 million seed round at the beginning of next year, in order to add experienced business development staff and refine its modulators for first-customers in the test and measurement sector. 

The startup also won financial support from Innobooster and enjoyed Venture Kick’s entrepreneurial training camps: “The very-concrete feedback helped us improve immensely. It’s also valuable to be able to network with founders at similar stages in different fields,” says Hoessbacher, who is delighted at her transformation from researcher to entrepreneur. “It’s about moving research towards the market. This is our baby – I’d love to see it out there.”

www.polariton.ch

Source: Venture Kick