Indie Semiconductor Acquires EXALOS AG

Automotive technology solutions developer indie Semiconductor, a fabless semiconductor company whose technology supports driver safety and automation, has acquired EXALOS AG. The Swiss photonics company specializes in the design of high-performance optical semiconductors. The deal, which indie said accelerates design-in opportunities with Tier One and automotive OEMs, expands indie’s advanced driver assistance and user experience portfolio with near-infrared and visible superluminescent LED (SLED) products, as well as semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) products. Specifically, indie said that EXALOS’ SLEDs for fiber optic gyroscope and SOAs will complement its existing portfolio of laser and silicon photonics products geared toward automotive technology applications.

Through the acquisition, indie Semiconductor gains a team of 17 engineers, including expertise in bright sources based on EXALOS’ proprietary gallium nitride process. According to Donald McClymont, indie Semiconductor co-founder and CEO, EXALOS’ offerings will enable head-up display, high-brightness visible lighting and inertial measurement unit-based navigational applications. The acquired technology will also help to expand indie’s frequency-modulated continuous-wave lidar portfolio.

Subject to the terms and conditions of the definitive agreement, indie paid approximately $45 million to EXALOS equity holders, composed of 6.6 million indie class A common shares. Indie acquired photonics components designer and manufacturer TeraXion in 2021, and it formally established a business unit, VisionQ, focused on high-quality perception-enabled vision processing solutions one month later. Earlier this year, indie acquired GEO Semiconductor, a provider of video processing technology for automotive cameras.