Metalenz, which appeared in 2021, replaces traditional multi-element lens stacks with a complex, nearly-2D surface that captures light through a single lens to enable much smaller imaging modules. Its sensors are optimized not for conventional high-quality RGB photos but to provide depth, object and material recognition and other computational-sensing data. The company has moved beyond lab prototypes and is already shipping orders in the millions, enabled by a manufacturing partnership with integrator STMicroelectronics. Metalenz says it has module designs that can fit a wide range of form factors and has locked another buyer for its original imaging device expected to hit the market in 2023. Earlier in the year it announced PolarEyes, a polarized-light sensing product that can detect materials/textures and provide limited depth perception, positioned as a cheaper, thinner facial-recognition alternative. Metalenz is directing the new funding toward testing, scaling PolarEyes, and expanding production and customer testing. Metalenz designs meta-optic lenses and 3D sensors manufactured on semiconductor foundries, using patterned structures far smaller than a human hair. The company’s core product is a flat, meta-optic lens that can combine multiple optical functions into a single thin surface and enable brighter, higher-quality infrared and 3D imaging. Metalenz holds an exclusive worldwide license to foundational metasurface IP from Harvard’s Capasso Lab and says it has 15 issued patents and a decade of research behind the technology. The startup is fabless, focusing on design and engineering while tapping contract manufacturers to mass-produce its sensors. The new funding is intended to scale production and accelerate development of its miniature optics and lens technology for smartphones, consumer, health care, and automotive use cases. Metalenz says it is already engaged with several of the world’s largest manufacturers, from OEMs to subsystem makers, and aims to enable under-display sensors and improved battery life for devices. The company was cofounded in 2017 by Robert Devlin and Federico Capasso and is based in Boston.

Total raised

$40M

Funding rounds

2

Latest round

Series B

Latest activity

Oct 2022