Photonics is experiencing a large boom leading to thousands of inventions and new applications. Mergers and Acquisitions (M&As) and investments play a critical role in sustaining the growth of the photonics industry. Read our summary of M&A deals and investments in the photonics industry for April 2026.
Mergers & Acquisitions in Photonics
The fourth month of the year has been fruitful for the photonics industry. A total of twenty-nine (29) M&As have been noted all over the globe this April. Twenty-six (26) of these were acquisitions while three (3) were mergers. Of the total acquisitions recorded for this month, nine (9) were made by acquiring companies from Europe. On the other hand, there were eleven (11) European-based companies that were acquired this April.
Let’s first take a look at the mergers for this month:
- Terra Quantum (Switzerland), a quantum technology company, and Mountain Lake Acquisition (USA) executed a strategic business combination agreement valued at $3.25 billion whereby the new entity will be listed publicly.
- Blue Marble Geographics (USA), a geospatial software specialist, and mobile mapping solutions Avenza Systems (USA) merged into a single entity, bringing together their “complementary geospatial technologies that connect high performance spatial analysis in the office with reliable execution in the field.”
- NorthStar Earth & Space (Canada), a space and satellite data analytics company, merged with Viking Acquisition (USA) to become a publicly traded company and “to accelerate deployment of its space-based sensor network and scale its data and analytics platform.”
As to the M&As involving European companies, below are some of the notable transactions:
- Hexagon (Sweden), one of the leading measurement & positioning technologies specialists in the world, acquired non-destructive testing solutions provider Waygate Technologies (Germany) for $1.45 billion, enabling Hexagon to expand into the non-destructive testing market.
- VertiGIS (United Kingdom), a geospatial solutions company, acquired advanced Location Master Data Management (LMDM) software provider 1Spatial (United Kingdom) for £87 million to “power the next generation of intelligent, insight-driven geospatial networks.”
- EOS (Germany), a leading provider of 3D printing solutions, expanded its industrial metal additive manufacturing through the acquisition of a specialist in high-quality metal powder company, Metalpine (Austria).
- InnovMetric (Canada), a 3D metrology software solutions provider, acquired its strategic partner and 3D coordinate metrology specialist Duwe-3d (Germany) in a transaction that will improve the expertise of InnovMetric’s European division as well as expand its technical services offering.
- Stereotaxis (USA), a surgical robotics pioneer, acquired for $45 million Robocath (France), a provider of robotic technologies for interventional cardiology and neurointerventions, and, thereby, improving its position as a “leading platform for the full spectrum of endovascular procedures.”
EPIC members were active players in several key M&As in the photonics industry for this April. All in all, there were six (6) M&As involving EPIC members. Two of these were entered by and between EPIC members. First, optical, thermal, and power technologies and solutions provider and EPIC member AMS Technologies (Germany) acquired another member Bay Photonics (United Kingdom), a specialist in photonics assembly and packaging for quantum, sensing, and telecom innovations. With its acquisition of Bay Photonics, AMS Technologies significantly improved its “capabilities in photonics system design, integration, and manufacturing.” Exosens (France), an EPIC member and provider of “mission and performance-critical amplification, detection and imaging technology”, acquired Emberion (United Kingdom / Finland), also a member of EPIC and a leading infrared sensors designer and manufacturer. The acquisition is expected to enable Exosens to become a “leading provider of advanced imaging technologies across the full spectrum of light.”
Below are the other M&As throughout the globe involving members of EPIC:
- Ushio (Japan), a member of EPIC, acquired the Laser Device Business of Kyocera (Japan) in a share acquisition transaction that will result to the creation of a new company by Ushio.
- Merck (Germany), a member of EPIC, acquired the Chromatography Business of JSR Life Sciences (USA) to improve its downstream purification portfolio and enhance its scalable manufacturing and speeding therapy access.
- SPIE (France), a member of EPIC, acquired turnkey cleanroom solutions provider BLOCK Group (Czech Republic) to improve its “position in industries with stringent technical requirements and higher value-added services.”
- Marvell Technology (USA), data infrastructure semiconductor solutions provider, acquired high-speed, low-power plasmonics-based silicon photonics devices developer and EPIC member Polariton Technologies (Switzerland) to advance its optical performance scaling to 3.2T and beyond.
Rounding up the M&As for this month are key acquisitions throughout the globe. First, Amazon (USA) acquired satellite communication solutions provider Globalstar (USA) for $10.8 billion as it expands its Amazon Leo satellite network and adds “direct-to-device (D2D) services to its low Earth orbit satellite network.” Next Credo (USA), a high-speed connectivity solutions provider, acquired Silicon Photonics technology leader DustPhotonics (Israel) for $750 million, thereby expanding its range into silicon photonics and next-generation optical connectivity. Lastly, York Space Systems (USA), a space and defense company providing a comprehensive suite of mission-critical solutions, acquired ALL.SPACE (United Kingdom), a provider of advanced satellite communications terminals and multi-network connectivity solutions, for $355 million to improve its capability for assured, multi-domain communications for critical missions.
Investments
The steady stream of funding in the photonics industry has likewise continued into the fourth month of this year with a recorded thirty-four (34) investment transactions all throughout the world. Twelve (12) of these were secured by European companies, including the following:
- Sereact (Germany) secured $110 million in Series B to scale “Cortex 2.0”, their next-generation robotic brain, and to likewise enter the United States market.
- UNIVITY (France), a space-based connectivity services provider, secured €27 million to “build a leading high-speed space-based internet infrastructure for telecom operators.”
- First Light Fusion (United Kingdom), a machine learning-driven simulation pioneer, raised £25 million in its latest funding round to further fuel its goal to “deliver affordable, scalable, fusion energy.”
- AlixLabs (Sweden), a pioneer in Atomic Layer Etching (ALE) technology for next-generation semiconductor manufacturing, raised €15 million in Series A for the advancement of the development of its proprietary ALE solutions.
- Orange Quantum Systems (The Netherlands), a provider of solutions for testing quantum chip performance, raised €15 million in its bid to develop faster quantum chip testing.
Key funding were likewise secured across the globe this April:
- Saronic (USA), a developer of autonomous surface vessels for naval and maritime forces, raised $1.75 billion in its latest funding round.
- L3Harris Technologies (USA), a leading technology and defense company, secured a$1 billion funding “to expand and modernize facilities, accelerate research and development, and increase production capacity for critical national security technologies.”
- Quantum Art (Israel), developer of full-stack trapped-ion quantum computers, secured a $140 million in a Series A round to aid its push for commercial-scale quantum computing.
- Pudu Robotics (China), a leading commercial service robotics company, raised $150 million to accelerate the development of embodied AI technologies and help the company expand globally, among others.
- SBQuantum (Canada), developer of quantum diamond magnetometers, obtained $4 million in its latest seed round to help its expansion after the deployment of its quantum sensors in space.
- Qubitrium (Turkey), a quantum communication and quantum sensing specialist, secured a €2.25 million capital to advance product development and deployment readiness, among others.
- IVWorks (South Korea), a GaN epitaxial wafer technology specialist, secured $4.5 million to expand ‘reGaN’ Technology into RF and AI power semiconductor markets.
EPIC members likewise secured and provided funding opportunities for this month. Member of EPIC CamGraPhIC (United Kingdom) secured a €211 million funding to build a next-generation optical technology to resolve one of the key issues in AI (artificial intelligence): “increasing interconnect bandwidth whilst reducing power consumption.” Another EPIC member, IQE (United Kingdom), raised £81 million in a strategic investment that will aid the company in executing its growth strategy. Likewise, the venture capital arm of EPIC member Intel (USA), Intel Capital, is among the investors that funneled funding into neutral atom quantum computing company Q-Factor (USA) in the latter’s latest seed funding round amounting to $24 million. Another member of EPIC, Keysight Technologies (USA), co-led the latest $50 million Series C funding round of measuring and control instrument manufacturing company Liquid Instruments (USA).
Note: The mergers and acquisitions (M&As) as well as the investments compiled in this article are based on information readily available at the date of the publication of this article. EPIC shall update the article whenever it comes across publication of other transactions after the release of this article. Readers are encouraged to inform EPIC in case of an omission of a particular M&A or investment for the subject month. Feel free to give us an email at info@epic-photonics.com for inquiries.
