Uviquity sells $2.5 million in debt as deep-UV laser sampling nears

Why it matters

Uviquity is financing the gap between a photonics prototype and OEM sampling. Its next test is proving the chip can leave the lab and reach foundry-scale economics.

Uviquity, the Raleigh photonics developer co-founded by M. Scott Burroughs, Russell Kanjorski and Brent Fisher, has sold $2.5 million of a planned $3.6 million securities offering as the founders prepare to put their first deep-ultraviolet laser into customers' hands.

A Form D filed July 21st shows that Uviquity completed the first sale on July 15th and has $1.1 million left to raise. Three investors have participated. The filing is a new notice, rather than an amendment to an earlier offering.

The securities are identified as debt and as securities that can be acquired through the exercise of an option, warrant or another right. The filing does not disclose the interest rate, maturity, conversion terms, valuation, investor identities or planned use of proceeds. It lists no sales commissions, finders' fees or proceeds earmarked for executive officers, directors or promoters.

Cy Schroeder, a principal at Emerald Development Managers, is listed as a Uviquity director alongside Burroughs and Kanjorski. Emerald led Uviquity's previous seed round, although Schroeder's board role does not establish that Emerald participated in the new offering.

The founders are returning to semiconductor photonics

Burroughs, Kanjorski and Fisher previously worked together at Sense Photonics, a Research Triangle Park lidar developer founded in 2016. Ouster acquired Sense Photonics in October 2021 for approximately 10 million Ouster shares after closing adjustments.

Burroughs, Uviquity's CEO, previously held photonics and semiconductor-laser roles at Bell Labs, Nortel Networks and Santur. Uviquity says he has worked across seven startups and holds over 20 patents. Kanjorski, Uviquity's chief commercial officer, previously practiced corporate law and worked at Boston Consulting Group before moving into solar and photonics ventures. Fisher, Uviquity's chief scientist, holds a doctorate from MIT and was also Sense Photonics' founding scientist and chief scientist.

The trio founded Uviquity in 2022 around a familiar manufacturing thesis: use semiconductor fabrication and photonic integration to shrink an optical system that has traditionally depended on larger, costlier components.

Uviquity's photonic integrated circuit sends light from a 445 nanometer gallium-nitride blue laser through an aluminum-nitride waveguide. Second harmonic generation doubles the light's frequency, producing ultraviolet output at roughly half the original wavelength. Uviquity is developing the architecture for far-UVC disinfection around 222 nm and deep-UV sensing applications across the 200 nm to 230 nm range.

The approach competes with products such as Ushio's Care222, which combines a krypton-chloride excimer lamp with an optical filter that blocks unwanted wavelengths above 230 nm. Uviquity says its spectrally narrow semiconductor output can eliminate the lamp and filter assembly, producing a smaller source with a longer operating life and lower manufacturing cost. Those performance and cost advantages remain Uviquity's claims until products reach customers and production volumes.

New capital arrives before customer sampling

The financing follows Uviquity's May 5th introduction of a 229 nm deep-UV laser, Uviquity's first announced product. Uviquity plans to begin sampling the laser to original equipment manufacturers in the fourth quarter of 2026, targeting analytical and inspection instruments used in semiconductor manufacturing, pharmaceutical production, environmental monitoring, petrochemicals and defense.

Uviquity says the laser is built on the same aluminum-nitride platform intended for its far-UVC disinfection products and is covered by over 20 pending patents. Selling into analytical instruments gives Uviquity a second commercialization route while its broader disinfection platform remains under development.

The timing puts the new capital between product announcement and customer sampling. Uviquity has not specified how it will spend the proceeds. Its previously disclosed roadmap calls for customer samples in 2026, pilot production in 2027 and a transfer to foundry manufacturing in 2028, according to AgFunderNews. That schedule requires Uviquity to fund packaging, testing, product qualification and manufacturing work before volume revenue is visible.

Uviquity has disclosed little commercial evidence so far. Uviquity has not named a paying customer, published revenue or pricing, or disclosed a production deployment. Kanjorski told AgFunderNews in 2025 that Uviquity was working with one of North America's largest lighting manufacturers, without identifying it. The planned fourth-quarter samples will be the first announced test of whether instrument makers can build around the chip.

At least $9.1 million in disclosed private financing

Uviquity emerged from stealth on May 7th, 2025, with an announced $6.6 million seed round. Emerald Development Managers led that financing, with AgFunder and MANN+HUMMEL participating.

The $2.5 million already sold in the new offering brings Uviquity's publicly disclosed private financing to at least $9.1 million. Uviquity has also received a $200,000 Department of Energy Phase I SBIR award for a solid-state far-UVC source aimed at reducing the energy required to improve indoor-air quality.

The remaining financing target is modest beside the capital required to move a new semiconductor platform into foundry production. Uviquity's near-term task is narrower: deliver working laser samples, establish performance outside its own laboratory and give OEMs enough confidence to design the source into instruments. The July offering gives Burroughs, Kanjorski and Fisher additional runway for that handoff, without yet revealing the terms investors required to fund it.