today’s information infrastructure and are used by Internet service providers, the government, the finance industry, researchers, and utility companies. In many data centers, however, the computer servers are connected by copper cabling, which has a limited bandwidth that only decreases with distance.
Earlier this week, Luxtera revealed that it has raised a $21.7 million in a round that includes a new investment from Tokyo Electron, the semiconductor equipment maker, along with existing investors August Capital, Lux Capital, New Enterprise Associates, and Sevin Rosen Funds.
“Everyone sees this silicon photonics coming,” Bergey says, “and companies like Tokyo Electronics want to engage so they can move to the next-generation technology.”
Luxtera characterized its latest slug of funding as a C round, even though it had previously described a $22 million venture investment in 2006 as a C round. Lux Capital’s Larry Bock and Josh Wolfe also told me in 2009 that Luxtera had raised another $26.7 million at the end of 2008.
Asked to clarify the matter, a Luxtera spokeswoman said in an email, “After the 2008 round there was a restructuring of the company. Since the restructuring, Luxtera had a B round and now are having a C round.”
The company was founded in 2001 to advance technology invented mostly by a group of researchers at the California Institute of Technology, including Cary Gunn, Michael Hochberg, Tom Baehr-Jones, and Axel Scherer. Since then, VentureWire reports that Luxtera has raised at least $91.7 million in venture capital. Bergey says he would not discuss how much the company has raised altogether.
