UK made: PragmatIC raises $80m for production line in North East

Update: December 12, 2023

“This Series C round is a testament to the potential for our technology,” said CEO Scott White. “Our FlexLogIC-002 fab will deliver significantly higher capacity than our first line. In addition to supporting our commercial ramp, it provides a template for rolling out a distributed global network, offering a fab-as-a-service for dedicated production on customer sites to secure Semiconductor supply chains.”

The company has developed a range of low-cost flexible RFID ICs built on plastic substrates, as well as a foundry service.

This year it moved up in complexity and demonstrated physically-flexible microprocessors including a 6502 and minimalist Arm Cortex-M0 called PlasticArm “which is 12 times more complex than previous state-of-the-art flexible electronics,” according to PragmatIC.

Arm and PragmatIC are both based in Cambridge, and Arm has participated in this funding round.

“Billions of everyday objects could benefit from being part of the Internet of Things, but to continue to scale sustainably we need to explore new approaches for embedding intelligence into everyday objects,” said Arm CTO Dipesh Patel. “Flexible electronics can extend the range and scope of what is possible today, and we see massive potential for it to be creatively adopted by the Arm ecosystem.”

“The round has been subscribed by group of industrial and individual investors with significant experience in the semiconductor industry,” according to PragmatIC board chair Erik Langaker. “Their backing will enable the team to more than double in size over the next 12 months and expand capacity to fulfil the growing demand for electronics in everyday objects.”

PragmatIC shareholders include Cambridge Innovation Capital, Arm and Avery Dennison.