Photonics West for the win

Each year, the SPIE Prism Awards reflect the rapidly growing trajectory, exciting latest developments, and rich technical innovations across photonics and photonics-enabled industries. This year, the annual ceremony honored a range of established and emerging companies applying innovative and creative solutions to critical problems in areas such as augmented and virtual reality, sensors, lasers, quantum technology, and biomedical optical solutions. For consideration this year, SPIE received 76 applications from 19 countries. The 2023 winning companies and products in the eight categories are:

• AR VR MR: TriLite Technologies, Trixel 3
• Biomedical: Philophos, KUOS-O100
• Cameras and Imaging: Metalenz, PolarEyes
• Lasers: Kyocera SLD Laser, LaserLight LiFi system
• Quantum Tech: QuiX Quantum, 20-mode quantum photonic processor
• Sensors: Ocean Insight, SpeedSorter
• Software: Dotphoton, Jetraw
• Test and Measurement: Precitec Optronik, Flying Spot Scanner (FSS 310)

Finalists and winners were selected by a panel of international judges who leveraged their knowledge and acumen from across the technology commercialization and funding sectors. The distinguished judges’ roster included the FDA’s Zane Arp, iFocus’ Adi Diner, AXA-XL’s Simi George, MKS Instruments’ Marc D. Himel, Coherent’s Qiongying Hu, Chromacity’s Shahida Imani, Teledyne Princeton Instruments’ Jason McClure, Technology Scotland’s Alison McLeod, Tesseract Health’s Nishant Mohan, Engender Technologies’ Cather Simpson, Ceres Technology Advisors’ Linda Smith, Toptica’s Mark Tolbert, and Nanovation’s Ferechteh Teherani.

The evening before, Swave Photonics – with their Holographic eXtended Reality chips based on proprietary diffractive photonics technology – was announced the winner of the $10,000 top prize at the 13th annual SPIE Startup Challenge.

Qart Medical, utilizing biophotonics and data for 3D analysis of sperm cells during IVF, received $5,000 for second place. PhosPrint came in third, winning $2,500, with their novel bioprinting technology that repairs in vivo human tissue during surgery. All cash prizes are provided by SPIE Startup Challenge founding partner Jenoptik.

The SPIE Startup Challenge, a pitch competition held annually by SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics, showcases new businesses, products, and technologies that address critical needs by utilizing photonics in the areas of healthcare and deep tech. This year’s finalists included innovations in medical diagnostics, medical imaging, food safety, and display technology.