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3D sensor chip and solutions provider Adaps Photonics recently completed a C+ round financing of hundreds of millions yuan. The completion of the new financing round will help the company further solidify its technological advantages in the dToF field and expand commercial applications in more scenarios.
Adaps Photonics is a company with mature 3D stacked dToF chip design and process capabilities. It excels in high PDE (Photon Detection Efficiency) and high-performance SPAD (Single-Photon Avalanche Diode) device design and process capabilities. The PDE based on a wavelength of 905nm reaches 25%, and the company has applied for more than a hundred domestic and international patents. In terms of product research and development, based on an understanding of the demand in the 3D vision market, the company has launched three complete product series: Silicon Photomultiplier (SiPM), Single Photon Imaging Array (SPADIS) and dToF modules, and finite point dToF chips and modules. These products cover a wide range of 3D sensor application terminals and scenarios, including automotive LiDAR and intelligent cockpit sensing systems, mobile phones, XR headsets, robots, smart home appliances, and smart buildings. Currently, the company's products have begun mass production and are gradually being incorporated into downstream customer products such as automotive, consumer electronics, smart homes, and industrial applications. Single-point products have already achieved mass production and shipments in consumer end products such as hair dryers and mobile phones, and SiPM products are ready for mass production in vehicles.
dToF (direct Time of Flight) is a depth sensor technology solution mainly used for ranging and 3D imaging. It emits light pulses directly to the target object and captures the reflected light pulses, and calculates the distance to the target object by recording the flight time of the light pulses. dToF has excellent ranging capability and high adaptability, and its characteristics of low cost, low power consumption, and high reliability can meet the requirements of most common platforms from smartphones to cars, homes to industries.
Adaps Photonics is also exploring the application of dToF in the automotive scene. The company has teamed up with numerous partners in the automotive field to layout dToF in automotive LiDAR, DMS sensors, and other automotive terminal devices. Currently, the company's products have been evaluated by multiple LiDAR manufacturers and have been imported in small batches. Strategic cooperation agreements have been reached with various upstream and downstream companies in the automotive field, jointly promoting the integration of LiDAR into vehicles and accelerating the development of intelligent vehicles towards the direction of three-dimensional perception.
At the same time,Adaps Photonics is also accelerating its strategic layout in XR. In 2022, Adaps Photonics collaborated with Qualcomm and Horizon Robotics, and equipped the Adaps Photonics Spot dToF chip on the Snapdragon 8Gen2 processor. It successfully created a new "Director Mode" on Android smartphones, enabling functions such as fast focusing, optimization for complex lighting scenes, focus switching, and focus tracking, thereby enhancing the video shooting experience for Android smartphone users. In the future, Adaps Photonics will further deepen its research and development cooperation on dToF in consumer electronic chips with partners, while expanding the application of this technology in the XR field.
Over the past year, the bull market returned, with technology leading the way.
As I said back in October 2024, the rally that began on September 24 was not merely a rebound, but a reversal. Since then, China's capital markets have undergone a broad revaluation, moving from undervaluation toward fair value.
The Shanghai Composite Index reached its highest level in a decade. The "Yi-Zhong-Tian" trio—Eoptolink, Zhongji Innolight and TFC Communication, three prominent Chinese optical communications stocks—saw their share prices multiply severalfold in a single year. Cambricon's market capitalization briefly exceeded RMB 600 billion. Elsewhere in the technology sector, triple-digit price-to-earnings ratios and valuations exceeding RMB 10 billion became commonplace.
Some investors were greedy; others, fearful. Still others asked me: Are technology stocks in a valuation bubble?
My answer is that what we are witnessing is the hunger and anxiety of an era, reflected in the capital markets. Once you understand this, the current fervor for technology investing is no longer difficult to explain.
Investment has nothing to do with macroeconomics, but everything to do with geopolitics.
China-US relations will shape the investment landscape for decades to come. Geopolitics has played a major role in shaping the hunger and anxiety of our times, fundamentally reshaping the way we invest.
What, then, lies at the heart of China's hunger and anxiety?
The Fourth Industrial Revolution is already underway, yet China has not fully overcome the technological shortcomings left by the Third. There is no time to lose.
This is why some people wonder: Why do Chinese computing chip companies command such high valuations when their technologies still lag so far behind NVIDIA's? Why does NVIDIA trade at just 50 times earnings, while a company hailed as "China's answer to NVIDIA" commands a multiple of 300?
To me, this gets the logic exactly backward.
It is precisely because these companies cannot catch up with NVIDIA in the near term that they command a higher strategic premium. The wider the technological gap, the greater the strategic value.
The further something lies beyond our reach, the stronger our hunger. The harder it is to catch up, the deeper our anxiety. If China were to achieve a complete breakthrough in computing chips one day, valuations might actually come down.
Where can one find China's most spectacular natural landscapes?
Much of the answer, I believe, lies in and around the Hengduan Mountains: the Meili Snow Mountains, Jade Dragon Snow Mountain, Mount Gongga, Mount Siguniang, Jiuzhaigou, and many others. Vast differences in elevation and deep fault lines have given rise to landscapes of extraordinary grandeur.
Hard-tech investing follows a similar logic.
Technological gaps, discontinuities in capabilities, and missing links in industrial systems: a leap in difficulty brings a leap in valuation, and a successful breakthrough can, in turn, bring a leap in returns.
This logic extends well beyond computing chips. It is equally evident in memory semiconductors, commercial spaceflight, and other sectors where China still faces substantial technological gaps with other countries.
It was precisely this conviction that led CoStone Capital, starting in 2016, to decisively focus its investments on three areas: hard tech, emerging industries, and life sciences and healthcare. In this context, "hard tech" refers specifically to important industries in which China faces a technological gap with the United States.
Thanks to this forward-looking strategy, CoStone Capital established an early presence across the full value chains of key sectors, including semiconductors, artificial intelligence, and robotics.
Looking ahead, the frontiers of technological progress and industrial upgrading are boundless. Nor can the gaps in hard technology be closed overnight. The twin windows of opportunity presented by technological innovation and the development of homegrown alternatives to foreign technologies have only just begun to open.
The road ahead is long, but the future holds immense promise.
As an investment firm, CoStone Capital will continue to invest where the hunger and anxiety of each era run deepest, move forward with the tensions that shape our times, and extend our reach toward the most challenging—and most important—frontiers.
Spring 2026