Dutch Deep-Tech Firm Morphotonics Raises €40 Million to Take Nanoimprint Optics From AR Glasses Into AI Data Centres

Morphotonics, a Netherlands-based deep-technology company specialising in large-area nanoimprint lithography, has raised €40 million to expand its manufacturing technology from augmented-reality displays into optical components for artificial-intelligence data centres.

The round, reported on 22 September 2026, drew a broad group of investors, including 3M Ventures, Innovation Industries, the regional development agency BOM, Invest-NL, the European Innovation Council Fund, the European Investment Bank and the family office Ernij Next.

A decade of building a manufacturing platform

Morphotonics has spent more than a decade developing manufacturing systems that imprint extremely small optical structures onto materials at commercial scale. Nanoimprint lithography works by pressing a patterned mould into a resin layer on a substrate, replicating nanoscale features that can control how light travels through a material.

Compared with conventional lithography techniques used in semiconductor manufacturing, nanoimprint can be significantly cheaper for certain applications, particularly when patterns must be replicated over larger areas. The difficulty lies in achieving the precision, uniformity and yield required for high-volume production. Morphotonics' expertise is in making that process industrial.

From smart glasses to data centres

The company is best known for technology used to produce waveguides, the optical components that guide images into a wearer's field of view in augmented-reality glasses. Waveguides are among the most critical and costly components in AR devices, and their manufacturing has been a significant barrier to producing lightweight, affordable smart glasses at scale.

Morphotonics' next machine is expected to produce more than six million waveguides annually, a volume that points to the company's ambition to support mass-market AR devices as major technology companies invest in smart glasses.

The potentially larger long-term opportunity, however, may be in data centres. Morphotonics is moving into co-packaged optics, an emerging approach in which optical components are integrated closely with processors and switches, allowing data to be transmitted using light rather than conventional electrical connections over longer distances within a system.

Why light matters for AI

The rise of large AI models has transformed data-centre design. Training and running these models requires thousands of accelerators working together, exchanging enormous volumes of data. As clusters grow, the connections between chips have become one of the biggest constraints on performance and energy efficiency.

Electrical connections consume more power and lose signal quality as data rates rise and distances increase. Optical interconnects can carry more data over longer distances with lower energy consumption per bit. Co-packaged optics takes that advantage further by placing optical engines directly alongside switch or processor chips, reducing the power-hungry electrical paths between them.

Major semiconductor and networking companies have been developing co-packaged optics for several years, and the technology is expected to play a growing role in next-generation AI infrastructure. That creates demand for manufacturing techniques capable of producing precise optical structures at scale and at acceptable cost, the capability Morphotonics has spent years building.

A European deep-tech statement

The investor syndicate reflects strong institutional support for European deep technology. The European Innovation Council Fund and the European Investment Bank have become important backers of strategic technologies in Europe, while Invest-NL and BOM represent Dutch public support for industrial innovation. 3M Ventures brings a strategic dimension from one of the world's leading materials-science companies, and Innovation Industries is a Dutch investor focused on deep tech.

The Netherlands has a strong heritage in precision engineering and photonics, anchored by companies such as ASML, which dominates the market for advanced lithography equipment, and a dense ecosystem of suppliers and research institutions. Morphotonics is part of that ecosystem, and its growth aligns with European ambitions to strengthen capabilities in semiconductors and photonics, sectors viewed as strategically important for technological sovereignty.

Two markets, one platform

Morphotonics' strategy of serving both AR and data-centre markets with a common manufacturing platform has advantages. It diversifies revenue opportunities, reducing dependence on the pace of smart-glasses adoption, which has historically been slower than enthusiasts predicted. And the data-centre market offers large, immediate demand driven by AI investment.

The challenge is execution. Each market has specific technical requirements, qualification processes and customer expectations. Data-centre components must meet stringent reliability standards, and qualifying new suppliers can take considerable time. Success will depend on the company's ability to meet those requirements while scaling production.

Manufacturing as a moat

In hardware industries, manufacturing know-how can be one of the most durable competitive advantages. Designs can be copied or reverse-engineered, but the accumulated expertise required to produce precise components reliably, at high yield and low cost, is much harder to replicate. Morphotonics' decade of development in large-area nanoimprint is precisely that kind of know-how.

The company's position as a supplier of manufacturing capability, rather than a maker of finished consumer devices, also means it can serve multiple customers across industries. If several AR device makers and optical-component suppliers adopt its equipment and processes, Morphotonics could benefit from growth across the sector without betting on any single product succeeding.

For India, which has launched programmes to build semiconductor fabrication, packaging and photonics capabilities, the rise of co-packaged optics highlights the importance of advanced packaging and optical technologies in the next generation of AI hardware. Partnerships with European specialists could help Indian manufacturers and research institutions build expertise in these emerging areas.

The company's progress will also be watched as an indicator of whether Europe can turn its research strength in photonics into globally competitive manufacturing businesses, rather than seeing promising technologies scaled elsewhere.

The broader shift in AI infrastructure

Morphotonics' raise is part of a wider trend in which investors look beyond chips themselves to the infrastructure that surrounds them. Power delivery, cooling, networking, memory and optical interconnects have all become areas of intense innovation, as the AI boom exposes bottlenecks throughout the data-centre stack.

Photonics startups, in particular, have attracted growing investor interest as the industry recognises that moving data efficiently is as important as processing it. Companies that can manufacture optical components at scale, reliably and cost-effectively, may find themselves in a strong position as AI clusters continue to expand.

What comes next

With €40 million in new funding, Morphotonics is expected to accelerate the deployment of its next-generation manufacturing systems, deepen partnerships in the AR market and advance its entry into co-packaged optics. The coming years will reveal whether its nanoimprint technology can become a standard manufacturing tool for both smart glasses and AI data centres.

If it succeeds, Morphotonics could become a significant European supplier in two of the technology industry's most important growth areas, demonstrating how long-term investment in manufacturing innovation can position a company at the centre of emerging markets.