The Nordics’ first purely deep tech-focused fund Voima Ventures invests in Elfys, leading the 700€k seed round. Deep tech startup ElFys uses black silicon to revolutionize light sensing in safety and security, med tech and wearables.
Nordic startup ElFys is on a mission to transform the way we measure, collect and use light-carried information. Originally founded by a team of Aalto University researchers, they are the first in the world to combine the latest developments in solar cell technology with light detection, and thus, successfully apply black silicon to light sensing. The merger of these two research tracks has led Elfys to create a breakthrough technology that is able to capture virtually all of incoming light rays emitted.
“Most light sensing technologies capture about two thirds of light rays, whereas we can capture all of them. Our technology allows us to significantly improve the performance of any device that uses light detectors,” CEO Mikko A. Juntunen explains.
Limitless applications from safety and security to med tech and wearables
In the future, light sensing applications will be everywhere – in fact, they already are. In cars, our smartphones, wearable health tech devices and hundreds of medical applications, to name a few. ElFys firmly believes in their ability to significantly increase the light sensing capability of any of these devices.
“Our mission is to make the world a safer place. We are already offering immediate improvements to existing safety and security solutions, such as airport and hotel lobby scanners. In the future, we hope to see ElFys technology applied to med tech, where we see that we can have the most significant impact. In fact, our technology can already offer the same x-ray image quality as current devices, but with 30% less radiation,” Juntunen promises.
Voima Ventures’ fund team was not only impressed by ElFys’ ability to improve existing technologies and devices across various industries, but also its potential to help create new product categories in the future.
“Light-detection is one of the areas of deep tech that has major potential to significantly impact our lives today. However, we’re particularly excited about ElFys’ ability to influence the development of entirely new technologies and devices across the whole ecosystem, and see light-sensing applications expand from security and safety to the field of medical and consumer wearables. For example, we might see new, non-invasive and light sensing -based, medtech wearables for patients and the aging population,” says Inka Mero, Managing Partner at Voima Ventures.
The company has several ongoing pilots with industry leaders in safety and security, which they are not able to disclose at this time. However, ElFys is expecting to share their first applications and use cases with the public next year. Their newly acquired funding will be used to strengthen R&D and sales teams and help accelerate ElFys’ global growth.
