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21 Nov 2008
Ultrafast laser developer Raydiance bucks the downward economic trend by raising $20 million in new funding.
US firm Raydiance, a developer of compact and fully programmable ultrafast laser systems, has secured $20 million in new funding. The company plans to use the cash to scale up its infrastructure, develop its technology and enhance its ability to address larger commercial markets.
"After four successful years of developing the Raydiance ultrafast laser platform, bringing the technology to market and establishing a solid client base, this new round of funding will allow us to execute fully on our next stage of growth and development," said Raydiance co-founder and president Scott Davison.
To date, Raydiance has secured over $25 million in venture capital financing and $10 million in government funded R&D contracts, which enabled the launch of its first commercial product in 2007.
At the same time as the funding announcement, Davison also gave details of the new Raydiance Discovery 2.0 system, which is said to deliver double the pulse energy of its first-generation ultrashort pulse (USP) platform and peak powers up to 10 MW.
"Since launching our first ultrafast laser platform 18 months ago, Raydiance has been committed to constantly evolving each generation of this system while ensuring that customers have unencumbered access to our newest technology", he said. "The introduction of the Raydiance Discovery 2.0 system, combined with our secured round of funding, will enable the development of even more game-changing applications powered by Raydiance across a broader range of industries."
Davison lists two potential applications as the machining of advanced vascular stents and thin-film solar cell production.
Key features of the Raydiance Discovery 2.0 system are:
• Automated control of the system
• Plug-and-play platform operated by a LabVIEW-based graphical interface
• User-controlled pulse energy from 0.5 to 10 µJ per pulse
• User-controlled repetition rate from single shot to 300 kHz
• Pulse width of 800 fs (typical)
• Beam quality M2 less than 1.3 and pulse-to-pulse energy variation less than 2%
• Programmable triggering and pulse packet macros
• Cold or athermal ablation with micron precision
• Simple integration into CNC production environments and other third party C++ and LabVIEW-based applications
• Highly-reliable optical telecom components to ensure 24/7 operational performance
• Warm up time of less than five minutes
• Ability to operate over a wide range of environmental conditions
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