Light Trace wins £50,000 Blavatnik Prize for Innovation
April 2023, Bristol UK. Light Trace Photonics has been awarded QantX Venture’s Blavatnik Prize for Innovation.
Light Trace Photonics, co-founded by Dr Jake Biele (CEO, left above) and Dr Dominic Sulway (CTO, right above), is a startup pioneering integrated photonics - microchips capable of routing and manipulating light.
Light Trace’s mission is to use integrated photonics to unlock the full potential of photonics in providing efficient, deployable solutions to major issues including the climate crisis, mounting NHS pressures and lagging productivity.
The photonics industry is currently facing a skills shortage which threatens the commercialisation of technologies that hold great promise for tackling these issues. To tackle this, Light Trace has developed a cutting-edge educational device that lowers the photonics skills barrier and which promises to attract more students to photonics.
Akin to the Raspberry Pi, Light Trace’s device brings previously complex experimentation out of the lab and into the classroom where students can assemble their own photonic systems whilst learning the basics of how to program photonic chips in an engaging and interactive way.
Dr Jake Biele, says:
“The photonics industry has the potential to dwarf the electronics industry, however, few students are even familiar with the word photonics when they start university, let alone integrated photonics.
Our job is to inspire students into a photonic engineering career by introducing them to photonics in an engaging way. In doing so, we help prepare them for industry with the skills they will need to develop innovative & deployable technologies that can help tackle major issues.
We're thankful to QantX for their support, and look forward to working with them on our quest to unlock the full potential of photonics, one chip at a time.”
QantX is a leading venture capital firm with a mission to support and accelerate the growth of early-stage startups that leverage cutting-edge technologies to create a positive impact on society.
Their highly-competitive Blavatnik Prize for Innovation is designed to provide a route to equity investment for early-stage startups developing high-impact technology with £50,000 non-dilutive funding and continued mentoring from the QantX team.
QantX CEO, Richard Haycock, says:
“As the world develops new technologies at an exponential rate, photonics is emerging as a critical enabler of innovation and progress. By harnessing the power of light, photonics is driving advances in communication, sensing, computing, and more.
Light Trace Photonics have impressed us with their long term vision of integrated photonics and we are delighted to support them with a Blavatnik Prize for Innovation.”
If you are interested in finding out more about our educational device, or what we do at Light Trace Photonics, please reach out to us at contact@ltphotonics.co.uk.
