Recent announcements for new mixed-reality headsets that could reach the shelves in 2024 have boosted the AR market, including applications for industry and security segments. The global market for microdisplays designed for AR/VR use could reach $4 billion by 2027, according to a 2022 report by KBV Research, a 4x increase compared to 2020, with 10% of the total value captured by OLED technologies. 15 million units of AR smart glasses could be shipped worldwide by 2027, according to CCS Insight.
Is in this context that MICROOLED, a leading manufacturer of high resolution, low power consumption OLED microdisplays, announced a €21 million fundraising led Jolt Capital, a specialist in private equity for responsible deeptech companies, with the French sovereign wealth fund Bpifrance via its Innovation Defense vehicle, alongside both historical investors, Cipio Partners and Ventech.
The fresh capital will allow MICROOLED to finance the development of the next range of full colour, high luminance OLED solutions, expand manufacturing capabilities in Grenoble, and grow international sales teams in the security segment and the B2B ActiveLook platform model.
“We are very pleased with Jolt Capital and Bpifrance joining our cap table, and to see that our historical shareholders Cipio Partners and Ventech continue their support. All of them understand deeptech and the stakes of sovereignty. Innovation is at the heart of our strategy, and this new funding will allow us to double down on our efforts to bring to market the most disruptive technologies in the field of AR,” said Eric Marcellin-Dibon, CEO of MICROOLED.
According to the French company, smartphones and tablet PCs can be used as gateways to augmented reality, but smart glasses will soon become the dominant wearable equipment to do so. They will require the use of embedded microdisplays that can offer high luminance and contrast, but also very low power consumption from super lightweight batteries. Among competing technologies, organic LED (OLED) demonstrate an excellent overall performance compared to classic LED ones, and they are increasingly used for see-through Near-Eye Displays (NED) in viewfinder eyepieces for cameras.
“MICROOLED is the archetypal growth deeptech company that we are looking for at Jolt. Patented core technologies in the field of semicon, a genuine potential to build manufacturing capacity in Europe, a series of fast growing B2B markets, and powerful but energy frugal products. We are delighted to have them join our portfolio and are looking forward to helping them scale to global leadership in light AR,” commented Pierre Garnier, Managing Partner at Jolt Capital.
“We are delighted to become a shareholder of MICROOLED, to help them reach another level in terms of technology development, sales, and industrial capacity. MICROOLED is a key global supplier of the near-eye microdisplays market, for both military and civilian applications. It perfectly matches the strategy of the Defense Innovation Fund, aiming at supporting the growth of tomorrow’s deeptech champions,” added Nicolas Berdou, investment director at Bpifrance.
MICROOLED position itself as one among the handful of international players able to design and manufacture these low-energy consumption OLED microdisplays. The French company assures that it can address both consumer and recreational markets (the ActiveLook head-up display module to be embedded in glasses for real-time visual information in hand-free activity use cases), and industry/security ones.
Founded in 2007, the Grenoble-based company has developed a wide range of core technologies derived from the semiconductor industry, protected by over 170 granted patents, through close collaboration with neighbor CEA/Leti research centers. MICROOLED is perfectly positioned to grab leadership in the field of wearable ultra-lightweight HUDs. To cater to the various needs for “light AR” applications, the company offers a line-up of compact products ranging from 0.2” to 0.6” in size, with high resolution and power as low as 1mW.
