Stephan Jacquemot of TS Ventures says NVIDIA itself has financed a competitor to Eindhoven-based Photon Bridge, whose laser-bundling strategy he compares to Soviet Soyuz rockets.
Jacquemot calls the Invest in Germany summit a political event with large companies rather than a venture capital gathering, and argues the infrastructure layer's value does not sit with Germany.
Düsseldorf-based Ubitium, which raised 14m dollars in mid-October for a universal AI processor, could get a real-world test bed from Quantum Systems, whose CEO Florian Seibel is a business angel in the company.
Two European Chip Startups Bet on AI's Hardware Layer
Stephan Jacquemot says the AI infrastructure layer captures most of the value, and Germany holds little of it. Photon Bridge and Ubitium go after two chip-level problems, moving data between chips and running machine intelligence at the edge. Both need heavy capital and remain unproven at scale, yet each has a plausible route to buyers or customers.
Takeaways
AI's infrastructure layer holds the value, not Germany. Stephan Jacquemot argues the infrastructure layer captures most of the economic value in AI, and that value does not sit in Germany. NVIDIA's German investments deepen dependence on a foreign chip maker, and Amazon plans 16bn euros for German data centers by 2027.
Photon Bridge bundles many small lasers. The Eindhoven startup builds lasers that move data between chips inside AI data centers. It combines many good-enough lasers instead of one perfect one, like the Soviet Soyuz rockets with many small reliable engines, aiming for reliability and strong unit economics.
Photon Bridge raised 10m euros. The round came from the Amadeus Apex Technology Fund, run jointly by Vienna-based Apex Ventures and London-based Amadeus Capital Partners. The company is about three years old. Paul Marshall, formerly of Photon Delta, became CEO in September to build the commercial side.
Capital needs are huge, but exits look plausible. Stephan says the capital requirement is huge and the technology must still prove itself at scale. NVIDIA has financed a competitor. He still sees good exits, because chip makers including NVIDIA would buy a working solution that raises data throughput cheaply.
Ubitium wants one chip for physical AI. The Düsseldorf company raised 14m dollars in mid-October. Drones and robots must perceive, decide and act, usually on separate processors. Ubitium proposes one modular chip for all three. Stephan sees strong tailwinds for physical AI but intense competition.
Quantum Systems could be Ubitium's test bed. Quantum Systems CEO Florian Seibel invested privately as a business angel. Stephan says the drone maker could supply drones for real-world testing. Founded in 2015 with an agricultural focus, it turned to defence after Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
Ubitium's roadmap depends on scaling and outsourcing. The current UB108 chip runs 256 compute elements, and the planned UBI 410 is meant to run 4096. Production is outsourced, possibly to Samsung in South Korea. Stephan adds that Germans, especially Düsseldorf companies, struggle to build things quickly.
Stephan's questions for Ubitium
He would ask when the technology becomes productive and how long commercial use takes after that.
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He would also ask how startups such as Quantum Systems can become customers of the chip.