Chiral, a Swiss nanotechnology company developing tools and processes to integrate nanomaterials into next-generation semiconductor and quantum devices, has closed a $12 million seed financing round to advance wafer-scale manufacturing.
The seed round was led by Crane Venture Partners, with participation from Quantonation, HCVC, and Founderful. The company also cited public funding support from Innosuisse.
Chiral said the new capital will help it push nanomaterial-based “post-silicon” computing toward industrial adoption as conventional silicon scaling faces mounting physical and economic constraints. The company is focused on making chips based on nanomaterials manufacturable at wafer scale, targeting performance and energy-efficiency improvements beyond what traditional silicon roadmaps can sustain.
While materials such as carbon nanotubes and two-dimensional materials have repeatedly demonstrated promise in academic research, Chiral argues that adoption has been held back by manufacturing limitations, including challenges around scalable integration, precision, and contamination control. The company said it was founded to address this bottleneck with what it describes as the industry’s first robotic nanomaterial integration system.
According to the announcement, the system is built around automation, high-precision engineering, and AI to enable selective, precise, and contamination-free placement of nanomaterials into silicon wafers, with the goal of translating single-device demonstrations into wafer-scale integration. Chiral said it has progressed from its earlier pre-seed stage by advancing automation and process control, developing its first commercial equipment system, and supporting customers in industry and research.
The company said the next phase will emphasize strengthening automation, precision, and throughput, alongside demonstrating reliability and scalability in real-world customer environments. Chiral also said it is moving from development into deployment, with its first commercial systems expected to be installed at customer sites this year.
Founded in 2023 as an ETH Zurich and Empa spin-off, Chiral is headquartered in Switzerland and positions its platform as a bridge between breakthrough materials research and manufacturable semiconductor and quantum technologies.
KEY QUOTES
“Nanomaterials have shown outstanding performance in research for years, but without scalable and controllable manufacturing, their impact remains limited,”
Seoho Jung, Chief Executive Officer, Chiral
“Chiral has the necessary capabilities that can turn material-level breakthroughs into industrial reality.”
Seoho Jung, Chief Executive Officer, Chiral
“The next foundational shift in computing won’t come from materials alone, it will come from making those materials work for real systems and real customers. Chiral brings that level of engineering discipline to nanomaterials, and that’s why we believe they have an important role to play in what comes after silicon,”
Krishna Visvanathan, Co-founder And Partner, Crane Venture Partners
“Our customers will soon announce results that demonstrate how Chiral’s technology has advanced their device performance. In parallel, we are moving from development into deployment, with our first commercial systems being installed at customer sites this year.”
Seoho Jung, Chief Executive Officer, Chiral
