Roadmap, a UK-based optical telecom network developer that spun out from Cambridge University, has raised $1.7m in a round led by Cambridge Enterprise, the institution’s tech transfer office.
Other investors in the round were not disclosed.
Roadmap, established in 2014 as a spinout from the university’s Centre for Advanced Photonics and Electronics, has developed a wavelength selective switch. This can be used in optical networks to split a light signal into different wavelengths.
This process enables networks to use different wavelengths of light to carry signals through a network. Roadmap’s technology relies on liquid crystals on silicon technology created at the university.
The investment will help Roadmap commercialise the technology. It follows a 2014 seed round, also led by Cambridge Enterprise, that achieved a £500,000 close.
Ian Vance, chairman of Roadmap, said: “The market is about to expand rapidly and this investment positions us to participate in this evolution. Our solutions will create the breakthrough in cost/performance that has been missing from this layer of telecoms and datacoms networks.”
