Singapore-based Nexstrom on September 22, 2026 closed a $12 million seed round to industrialise the first 12-inch single-crystal 2D semiconductor platform, taking transition-metal dichalcogenide (TMD) materials out of the research lab and onto commercial foundry wafers.
The round
Xora Innovation, the deep-tech arm of Singapore's Temasek, led the round with participation from Foothill Ventures and SEEDS Capital. The seed injection brings Nexstrom's total raised to $15 million, including $3 million in non-dilutive grant funding, according to the company's press release.
Founded in 2024 by CEO Phoebe Tan and Chief Scientist Dr. Lance Li, Nexstrom is developing equipment and processes that let chip foundries grow atom-thin TMD layers directly onto standard 300 mm silicon wafers used across the semiconductor industry.
Why 2D matters
Transition-metal dichalcogenides are semiconducting sheets one to a few atoms thick that offer better electron mobility, lower leakage and reduced heat generation than deeply scaled silicon. Industry leaders including TSMC and IMEC have flagged 2D channels as a leading contender for sub-1 nm-class logic in the 2030s, but growing high-quality monolayers over an entire 12-inch wafer has been out of reach.
Nexstrom's North Star deposition system combines a proprietary reactor with in-line process control to grow single-crystal 2D films at 300 mm scale. "In the lab, people can get very small, high-quality materials, but only on a very small scale. This is exactly the gap Nexstrom is addressing," co-founder Lance Li said.
Roadmap and use of proceeds
CEO Phoebe Tan said Nexstrom has "systematically scaled from 2 inches to 6 inches, and we are going to complete our 8 inch by the end of October," with 12-inch demonstration wafers targeted next. The startup will use the seed to expand equipment capacity, process control and metrology, hire process engineers, and stand up customer qualification programs with logic and memory foundries.
Stanford professor and Nexstrom board advisor H.-S. Philip Wong summed up the industry stakes: "The question is no longer whether 2D semiconductors matter. The challenge is making them manufacturable."
Context
The deal lands during a busy stretch for chip-materials capital. Tower Semiconductor last week committed $4 billion to a Japanese silicon-photonics hub, and Belgian Ka-band chip startup TUSK IC closed a €15M Series A for satellite beamformers in September. Investors are betting that novel materials and packaging - not just node shrinks - will underpin the next decade of AI accelerators.
Reporting based on coverage from PR Newswire, TechCrunch and Semiconductor Digest.