A maker of touch sensor technology that has seen its products used in everything from cordless drills to NASA robots has landed $31.5m (£23.7m) investment.
Peratech, which has operations in North Yorkshire and County Durham as well as China and Sweden, has completed a second major funding round. The injection was led by investor Dark Matter Partners and anchored by IP-secured debt, with $6.5m (£4.8m) in equity from new and existing investors being oversubscribed.
Bosses say the backing is a vote of confidence in the firm's user tactile interface tech, which can be used in PCs and laptops. It will now use the funding to develop its quantum tunnelling composite (QTC) force sensing system, which can sense applied force, its Hydra user interface software and its haptic feedback systems - the vibration users feel on certain devices when certain actions are performed.
Read more: Hundreds of North East jobs saved as metalwork firm bought out of administration
Read more: Accsys decides to abandon Tricoya construction material factory in Hull
The firm has secured work with who it describes as key leaders in the electronics industry, with its tech being used in keyboards, trackpads and gaming controllers. It also sells interfaces for the automotive market which are designed to cut driver distractions and make cabin environments more user friendly.
In 2017 Peratech raised $12.4m (£9.2m) from Dutch venture capitalists Merck Ventures and Arie Capital, as well as prior investors. And in 2021 the firm relocated its global research and development facility from Richmond to NETPark in County Durham to make use of its laboratory facilities.
Peratech CEO Jon Stark said: "Our force sensing and haptic feedback technologies not only make industry-leading haptic trackpads and force-enabled keyboards, but our control firmware and software does something that no other user interface product can: it makes the user interfaces intelligent. We use that intelligence to make PCs fundamentally easier, more engaging and more fun to use for every user type—from novices to professional content creators and gamers.
Most Read
"This financial injection is a major endorsement to the success we’ve had in making better user experience platforms on notebooks PCs and peripherals and enables us to capitalize on our commercial wins and scale up for market share.”
Scott Bell, joint managing partner at Dark Matter Partners, said: “Peratech has built a unique platform technology, with extremely strong IP foundations. They have proven commercial traction globally in large addressable markets. We believe in the management team and are excited to support their ambitions to scale up. We are also pleased to pioneer the ability of IP to act as the principal collateral in financing the technology leaders of the future.”