Nantero Lands $21M Financing for Its Carbon Nanotube Computer Memory

Nantero, a nanotech company building a new type of computer memory that it says is stronger than steel and less dense than aluminum, has raised $21 million in new financing. The company has now raised $110 million since its founding in 2001.

Based in Woburn, MA, Nantero is using its new funding to get its lead product, called NRAM, to new customers such as Fujitsu Semiconductor and Mie Fujitsu Semiconductor, the company said in a press release. Nantero also wants to bring other products to market, though it didn’t disclose what those might be.

Nantero’s technology is intended to replace flash memory and DRAM (dynamic random-access memory), boosting the former’s permanent storage capabilities and the latter’s density and speed, as Xconomy wrote in a 2008 profile of the company. NRAM (which stands for nonvolatile random-access memory) chips are made using carbon nanotubes—cylindrical tubes of carbon atoms that are tiny, strong, and have better thermal and electrical conductivity properties than any other materials, the company says.

Globespan Capital Partners led the new round of funding, alongside unnamed new and existing investors. Previous investors include CRV, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, and Harris & Harris Group.

Author: David Holley

David is the national correspondent at Xconomy. He has spent most of his career covering business of every kind, from breweries in Oregon to investment banks in New York. A native of the Pacific Northwest, David started his career reporting at weekly and daily newspapers, covering murder trials, city council meetings, the expanding startup tech industry in the region, and everything between. He left the West Coast to pursue business journalism in New York, first writing about biotech and then private equity at The Deal. After a stint at Bloomberg News writing about high-yield bonds and leveraged loans, David relocated from New York to Austin, TX. He graduated from Portland State University.