xLight, a burgeoning semiconductor startup, has announced a preliminary deal to receive up to $150 million from the U.S. Commerce Department. This large investment will turn the federal government into the company’s largest shareholder. It is an exciting milestone in the current push to strengthen semiconductor research and development in America.
The Commerce Department is clearly going big with this investment. This funding is included in a broader effort announced to shore up domestic semiconductor manufacturing. xLight intends to use this backing to manufacture cutting-edge machines that will be deployed outside semiconductor fabrication plants. These machines are 100 meters by 50 meters, or about the size of a football field. For example, they will produce extreme ultraviolet (EUV) light of unprecedented quality and accuracy, and down to the wavelengths of 2 nanometers, using free electron lasers.
This exciting new technology has the potential to go even beyond what ASML is currently capable of – which is 13.5 nanometer wavelengths. xLight does this by addressing the leading semiconductor industry’s greatest challenge: lithography. In so doing, it yields greater production efficiency and drives innovation across the entire industry.
“Nobody has committed yet, but the work is going on with everybody on the list that you would expect, and we’re having intense conversations with all of them,” said Pat Gelsinger, xLight’s executive chairman.
Besides the Commerce Department’s investment, xLight has raised $40 million from other investors, including Playground Global. The company is preparing for its next fundraising round in January. This move will help entrench its financial base even deeper as it seeks to continue growing under ambitious plans.
Perhaps unsurprisingly given our field’s startlingly ambitious overall timeline, xLight has established a blazing-fast pace for the work. The firm aims to roll out its initial silicon wafers by 2028. By 2029, it seeks to have its first commercial system in place and operating. This timeline aligns well with the urgent need to ramp up semiconductor production capacity. Demand is through the roof, especially in all of these key sectors.
xLight has recently entered into a letter of intent with the state of New York. They’ll be setting up their first machine at the CREATE site down near Albany. This partnership demonstrates xLight’s ongoing dedication to engaging with local and state governments to bring cutting edge technology to the community.
This collaboration with Zeiss, a global leader in optics, is a key pillar of the xLight strategy. The partnership combines Zeiss’s knowledge and expertise with xLight’s unique manufacturing technology. Combined, they’ll make sure the technology can stand up to the rigorous requirements of today’s advanced semiconductor fab.
As executive chairman of xLight, Gelsinger believes it is critical to political landscapes. “CEOs and companies should neither be Republican or Democrat,” he stated. Your job is to achieve the business purpose, provide for your investors, provide for your shareholders. That is your objective.”
Gelsinger is personally, almost religiously, committed to doing more than make money. He knows that energy policy is at the heart of the economy’s new direction. “How many nuclear reactors are being built in the US today? Zero. How many being built in China today? 39. Energy policy in a digital AI economy equals the economic capacity of the nation,” he remarked.
More challenges await Gelsinger, but the Intel CEO is upbeat on the future. He believes xLight will deeply enrich the semiconductor industry with economic influence and national interest. “It’s a minority investment, in a non-governing way, but it says we need this company to succeed for national interest,” he explained.
“As xLight prepares for its next steps, Gelsinger acknowledges the complexity of finalizing contracts and agreements required for the deal. ‘We’ve agreed in principle on the terms, but like any of these contracts, there’s still work to get done,’ he noted.”
Building xLight’s roadmap with a future-focused perspective. That’s not all—it further stands as an example for the rest of the tech industry to follow when exploring innovative applications in their own industries. If the smart startup can achieve its promise to overcome key challenges in semiconductor production, it may deliver a new paradigm of higher efficiency and production capability.
