Nexstrom lands $12M to build machines for post-silicon chips
What's the deal? NexstromDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, a Singapore semiconductor startup founded in December 2023, has raised $12 million in an early-stage round led by Xora InnovationDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, a venture firm connected to Temasek, Singapore's sovereign wealth fund. The company builds equipment to manufacture two-dimensional semiconductor materials at wafer scale.
What's the endgame? Nexstrom isn't trying to build fabs. It develops the materials and the machines that chip fabs would eventually use to make ultra-low-power chips for AI workloads.
What is it building? The company bets on transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs), such as molybdenum disulfide, that stay functional at just a few atoms thick. Using proprietary Metal-Organic Chemical Vapour Deposition (MOCVD) systems, it claims an industry first: monocrystalline 2D films on 300mm wafers, the standard size in advanced fabs.
Nexstrom reports 100x carrier mobility over conventional approaches at sub-1nm thickness, plus more than 50% better power efficiency than leading-edge silicon.
Who's behind it? Chief executive officer and co-founder Dr. Phoebe Tan also serves as a partner at Xora Innovation. Co-founder and chief scientist Dr. Lance Li has worked on growing 2D materials since 2012.
The startup collaborates with researchers at Purdue University, the National University of Singapore, and South Korea's Dankook University. Stanford's Dr. Philip Wong advises, and a joint technical paper on scaling 2D nanoribbons is expected in January 2026.
The signal: The $12 million round ranks in the upper tier of early-stage deals — roughly the 80th percentile by size. That backing signals investor appetite for hardware that could stretch chip performance beyond silicon's physical limits, just as AI demand pushes for lower power and smaller nodes.
Read more: cryptobriefing.com
Image credit: Onri Jay Benally
