Tsinghua-linked silicon photonics startup Lingdong Xinguang raises tens of millions in angel round
What's the deal? Chinese silicon photonics startup Lingdong XinguangDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → has raised tens of millions of yuan in an angel round led by Panlin CapitalDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, with participation from Huize Tiancheng.
The company will spend the funds on inter-chip optical interconnection technology, pushing its SmartComb light source toward commercialisation and developing its SmartPHY optical I/O chiplet.
Founded in 2022, Lingdong Xinguang designs silicon-based photonic integrated chips for the internet of things, including distributed fibre optic sensing and FMCW lidar.
Its founder is a professor in Tsinghua University's electronic engineering department who began silicon photonics research at MIT in 2009. Co-founder Wang Hui, also a Tsinghua University graduate, previously held R&D and management roles at firms including O-Network and BKtel.
Why now? As AI, quantum computing, and autonomous driving scale up, traditional copper-wire interconnects can no longer keep pace.
Optical interconnection between chips is now widely seen as the key to breaking computing power transmission bottlenecks — making silicon photonics one of the industry's hottest topics.
What could go wrong? Europe and the US still lead in advanced processes, high-end device design, and ecosystems.
Silicon photonics remains at an early stage, comparable to the dawn of integrated circuits, and Lingdong Xinguang must move its pipeline from sales to full mass production.
The signal: Backing an early-stage startup whose core technology traces back to more than a decade of Tsinghua University and MIT research, the round reflects how China's push to narrow the silicon photonics gap increasingly leans on academic spinouts. With optical interconnects seen as the way past copper's limits, Lingdong Xinguang is betting that domestically produced optical I/O can become foundational infrastructure for the country's AI compute ambitions.
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Image credit: Generated with Gemini
