EqualOcean has learned that Triple-Stone(Chinese: 三石园科技), a developer of passive optical devices, has recently closed tens of millions of CNY in a new round of financing.
Founded in 2015, Triple-Stone is a high-tech manufacturing enterprise that has long received attention from society and the media. Its main products are passive optical devices, which can be applied in IDC data centers, vehicle LIDAR, 5G communication, industrial laser, satellite communication and other fields.
Triple-Stone's core team worked for Oplink, a leading optical device company in the industry (acquired by Koch Industries in 2014), and its members came from Harvard University of Technology, University of Electronic Science and Technology and other universities, with more than 20 years of experience in R&D, production, and marketing in the field of optical communication. The founding team members have served the head customers in the industry for many years, and in the process discovered the trend of miniaturization and integration of passive optical devices.
The miniaturization and integration of passive optical device is related to practical application and cost control. On the one hand, the increasingly high transmission rate means that the transmission distance of electricity is dramatically shortened, and the distance of the backplane is therefore limited, so there is an objective need for miniaturization of the device; on the other hand, for the passive optical device, which accounts for more than half of the cost of materials, the scale application of small, integrated products can also reduce the number of materials used to lower the cost.
After design improvement, Triple-Stone's products have been reduced in size by nearly 90% compared with discrete devices, which significantly reduces material usage, and can lower the cost in mass production, help customers save a lot of space and improve the competitiveness of downstream products.
Starting from the familiar circulator, Triple-Stone continues to expand more application scenarios outside the communication field. Since the last round of financing, Triple-Stone has made some progress in product and market development.
In terms of products, compared with the single product line of circulators and EDFA at the initial stage, Triple-Stone has gradually expanded its product categories and added new product series such as WDM and DWDM optical switches. Currently, Triple-Stone has reached the world's leading position in terms of shipment volume of circulators.
In terms of market development, Triple-Stone has accumulated more than 300 customers, with 40-50 new customers every year. According to the introduction, it usually takes two years for a passive optical device product to go from design to mass production, and then to be verified by customers. In addition to the traditional communication field, Triple-Stone also actively explores LIDAR and other emerging areas of customers, its products for automotive LIDAR 1550nm route, has entered the supply chain of the head of the customer.
In the future, Triple-Stone plans to continue to develop product categories and add new product platforms, and at the same time, carry out surveying and mapping, medical, energy and other areas of market expansion.
The investors of this round of financing are Skytrace Capital(Chinese: 赛天资本) and South China Venture Capital(Chinese: 中南创投). The proceeds of the financing will be used for R&D investment, production capacity upgrade and product line expansion.