Top 10 Nanotechnology Startups to Watch in 2026

Executive Summary

LONDON, February 21, 2026 — The nanotechnology sector is undergoing a profound transformation, with the global market projected to reach $248.56 billion by 2030 at a CAGR of 17.8%, according to Fortune Business Insights. From silicon-anode battery materials powering the electric vehicle revolution to graphene-based brain-computer interfaces treating neurological disorders, nanotechnology startups are redefining what is commercially possible at the atomic scale. This comprehensive analysis profiles the 10 most promising nanotechnology startups to watch in 2026, ranked by total funding raised, examining their technology platforms, competitive positioning, investor backing, and market trajectories. The convergence of nanotechnology with artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and regenerative medicine is creating unprecedented opportunities for early-stage companies to capture substantial market share in industries worth trillions of dollars.

As we highlighted in our analysis of ESG startups, the intersection of deep technology with pressing industry needs can redefine market landscapes, attracting massive capital flows that accelerate innovation cycles. The nanotechnology startup ecosystem mirrors this pattern, with over 12,000 funding rounds completed across the sector and 6,500+ active investors deploying capital into companies manipulating matter at the nanoscale. The average funding round in the sector stands at $12.5 million, reflecting institutional confidence in commercialisation timelines that have shortened dramatically over the past five years.

Key Takeaways

• Global nanotechnology market projected to reach $248.56 billion by 2030 with 17.8% CAGR, driven by healthcare, energy storage, and quantum computing applications
• Top 10 startups have collectively raised over $3.2 billion in venture capital and government grants, led by Sila Nanotechnologies ($1.4 billion) and Group14 Technologies ($1.16 billion)
• Battery nanotechnology dominates funding, with silicon-anode and silicon-carbon composite materials commanding the largest investment rounds
• AI integration is accelerating nanotechnology R&D across drug delivery, cell therapy manufacturing, and materials discovery
• European startups are emerging as global contenders, with INBRAIN Neuroelectronics, Axelera AI, and Kiutra securing significant investment from both European and US institutional investors
• The convergence of nanotechnology with quantum computing is creating a new category of infrastructure startups addressing the helium-3 supply chain crisis

Top 10 Nanotechnology Startups Ranked by Total Funding

Top 10 Nanotechnology Startups to Watch in 2026 — Ranked by Total Funding

Rank	Company	Total Funding	Headquarters	Focus Area	Latest Round
1	Sila Nanotechnologies	$1.4B	Alameda, CA, USA	Silicon-anode battery materials	Series G ($375M, Jun 2024)
2	Group14 Technologies	$1.16B	Woodinville, WA, USA	Silicon-carbon battery materials	Series D ($463M, Aug 2025)
3	Axelera AI	$200M+	Eindhoven, Netherlands	AI processing chips (nanoscale)	€61.6M EuroHPC grant (Mar 2025)
4	Cellino Biotech	$125M	Cambridge, MA, USA	AI-guided laser cell therapy	$25M ARPA-H grant (Sep 2024)
5	Moleaer	$129M+	Hawthorne, CA, USA	Industrial nanobubble systems	Corporate round (Xylem, Sep 2025)
6	INBRAIN Neuroelectronics	$82.8M	Barcelona, Spain	Graphene brain-computer interfaces	Series B ($50M, Oct 2024)
7	Kiutra	€30M+	Munich, Germany	Magnetic cryogenic cooling	Series A (€13M, Oct 2025)
8	Elixira	Seed stage	Stockholm, Sweden	AI-guided nanobots	Seed (2025)
9	Nanize	Early stage	Narvik, Norway	PFAS-free nano-coatings	Seed (Valinor, 2024)
10	Morphle Labs	$5M+	San Francisco, CA, USA	AI-powered digital pathology	Series A ($5M, Nov 2025)

1. Sila Nanotechnologies — $1.4 Billion Raised

Sila Nanotechnologies, founded in 2011 by Gene Berdichevsky (Tesla employee number seven) and Gleb Yushin from Georgia Tech, has raised approximately $1.4 billion across 15 funding rounds through its June 2024 Series G. The Alameda, California-based company develops Titan Silicon, a silicon-dominant anode material that replaces graphite entirely in lithium-ion batteries, delivering significantly higher energy density for electric vehicles and consumer electronics. The technology addresses one of the most fundamental bottlenecks in battery performance: conventional graphite anodes limit how much energy a battery can store per unit of weight.

Sila's $375 million Series G round in June 2024, led by Sutter Hill Ventures and T. Rowe Price with participation from Bessemer Venture Partners and Coatue, valued the company at approximately $2 billion — a notable correction from its 2021 peak valuation of $3.3 billion, reflecting broader recalibrations in the deep-tech startup landscape. Bloomberg reported this represented a roughly one-third valuation reduction, though the funding quantum itself remained substantial. The company completed construction of its Moses Lake, Washington manufacturing facility in Q1 2025, with commercial production expected to begin in Q4 2025.

Mercedes-Benz, Panasonic, and three undisclosed OEMs are confirmed customers, positioning Sila at the centre of the automotive industry's electrification timeline. The company's core innovation lies in engineering silicon nanoparticles that can expand and contract during charge-discharge cycles without cracking — a problem that has plagued silicon-anode research for decades. By controlling the nanostructure of its materials, Sila achieves battery cells with 20-40% more energy density than equivalent graphite-based designs, a performance advantage that translates directly into extended EV driving range and reduced battery weight. As we noted in our analysis of emerging technology investments, companies solving fundamental engineering challenges at the materials level command premium valuations from strategic investors.

2. Group14 Technologies — $1.16 Billion Raised

Group14 Technologies, headquartered in Woodinville, Washington, has raised $1.16 billion across 10 funding rounds, establishing itself as the most heavily capitalised pure-play silicon-carbon composite battery materials company globally. The company's SCC55 (silicon-carbon composite with 55% silicon by weight) technology represents a different architectural approach to the silicon-anode challenge compared to Sila: rather than engineering pure silicon nanoparticles, Group14 encapsulates silicon within a carbon scaffold at the nanoscale, creating a composite material that can be processed using existing battery manufacturing equipment.

Group14's $463 million Series D round in August 2025 was raised despite significant headwinds in the clean technology investment market, a signal of deep institutional conviction in the company's commercialisation trajectory. The round attracted 24 institutional investors, with GeekWire reporting that the funding came amid broader pullbacks in climate-tech venture capital. The company acquired SK Materials' factory in South Korea, securing manufacturing capacity in Asia's battery supply chain heartland. Group14's SCC55 already powers the HONOR Magic7 Pro smartphone, demonstrating commercial viability in consumer electronics before scaling to automotive applications.

The company's BAM-2 (Battery Active Materials) plant at Moses Lake has experienced production delays of over one year, highlighting the engineering complexity of transitioning from laboratory-scale nanotechnology to industrial volumes. Nevertheless, the sheer scale of Group14's funding — second only to Sila among nanotechnology startups — underscores investor confidence that silicon-carbon composites will capture a substantial share of the $100+ billion battery materials market.

3. Axelera AI — $200 Million+ Raised

Axelera AI, founded in 2021 in Eindhoven, Netherlands, has raised over $200 million in combined equity and grants, positioning itself as Europe's leading AI chip startup leveraging nanoscale semiconductor design. While not a nanotechnology company in the traditional materials science sense, Axelera operates at the frontier of nanoscale engineering — its Metis AI processing units are fabricated using advanced process nodes that manipulate transistor structures measured in single-digit nanometres. CTO Evangelos Eleftheriou, a former IBM Fellow with 35 years at IBM Research, brings deep expertise in nanoscale device physics to the company's chip architecture.

The company secured a €61.6 million grant from EuroHPC in March 2025 to develop its Titania chiplet for high-performance AI inference — a RISC-V-based architecture designed to compete with NVIDIA's data centre dominance. Its $68 million Series B in June 2024, led by Samsung Catalyst Fund and the European Innovation Council Fund, was Europe's largest oversubscribed Series B in fabless semiconductors, according to company reports. By August 2025, Bloomberg reported that Axelera AI was in talks to raise an additional €150 million+ to expand edge AI and data centre chip production.

The Metis platform delivers 3-5x energy efficiency improvements over competing edge AI accelerators, a performance advantage rooted in novel nanoscale memory-compute architectures that minimise data movement — the primary source of energy consumption in AI inference workloads. With over 200 employees and growing, Axelera exemplifies how European deep-tech startups are leveraging nanoscale engineering to challenge Silicon Valley incumbents in the AI hardware space.

4. Cellino Biotech — $125 Million Raised

Cellino Biotech, founded in 2017 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, has raised $125 million in venture capital plus a $25 million ARPA-H government grant, developing an AI-driven, laser-based platform called NEBULA (NExt-generation Biomanufacturing ULtra-scalable Approach) that automates the production of personalised regenerative cell therapies. The company sits at the intersection of nanotechnology, laser physics, and artificial intelligence: its core technology uses laser-generated cavitation nanobubbles to precisely edit individual cells at 5-micron resolution, processing approximately 5,000 cells per minute with non-thermal ablation that prevents damage to neighbouring cells.

Cellino's $80 million Series A in January 2022, led by Leaps by Bayer with participation from Khosla Ventures, 8VC, Felicis Ventures, and The Engine Ventures (MIT), remains one of the largest Series A rounds in the cell therapy manufacturing space. The $25 million ARPA-H grant, awarded in September 2024 by the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health under the US Department of Health and Human Services, funds a five-year programme to deploy Cellino's cassette-based biomanufacturing systems at hospitals across the United States, as reported by Fierce Pharma.

The company's most significant 2025 milestone is its partnership with Massachusetts General Hospital to build the first-ever hospital-based autologous iPSC foundry in Boston, enabling on-site manufacturing of personalised stem cell therapies. This approach addresses a critical bottleneck: current outsourced clinical trial cell production costs approximately $1 million per patient, and Cellino aims to reduce this to tens of thousands of dollars through nanoscale-precision automation. The platform can reprogram patient cells into tissue types for treating Parkinson's disease (dopamine-producing neurons), diabetes (insulin-producing cells), heart disease (cardiac cells), and macular degeneration (retinal cells). With 123 employees and approximately $15 million in annual revenue, Cellino has progressed beyond pure R&D into commercial-stage operations.

5. Moleaer — $129 Million+ Raised

Moleaer, founded in 2016 in Hawthorne, California, has raised over $129 million to develop industrial-scale nanobubble generation systems that enhance water quality and efficiency across agriculture, aquaculture, mining, and wastewater treatment. The company's technology creates nanobubbles — gas-filled bubbles measuring less than 200 nanometres in diameter — that remain suspended in water for extended periods rather than rising to the surface like conventional bubbles. This fundamental physics property, governed by the high internal pressure of nanoscale gas cavities, enables Moleaer's systems to dramatically increase dissolved oxygen levels and improve chemical-free water treatment processes.

The company's $40 million Series C in June 2022, led by Apollo Global Management with participation from Husqvarna Group, brought total funding to approximately $61 million at the time. A subsequent corporate minority investment from Xylem in September 2025 expanded the partnership to scale nanobubble technology for municipal and industrial wastewater treatment plants globally. With over 4,000 installations deployed across 55+ countries, Moleaer has achieved remarkable commercial traction for a nanotechnology company, demonstrating that nanoscale engineering can deliver immediate, measurable ROI in traditional industries. The company has expanded its offering to include equipment monitoring and a Nanobubbles-as-a-Service (NaaS) model, reflecting the SaaS-ification trend penetrating even hardware-centric deep-tech startups.

6. INBRAIN Neuroelectronics — $82.8 Million Raised

INBRAIN Neuroelectronics, founded in Barcelona, Spain, has raised $82.8 million to develop graphene-based brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) for treating neurological disorders including epilepsy, Parkinson's disease, and chronic pain. The company's core innovation lies in using atomically thin graphene — a single layer of carbon atoms arranged in a hexagonal lattice — as the sensing material for neural implants, replacing conventional platinum and silicon-based electrodes. Graphene's exceptional electrical conductivity, biocompatibility, and mechanical flexibility at the nanoscale enable INBRAIN's devices to record neural signals with unprecedented precision while conforming to the brain's complex surface geometry.

INBRAIN's $50 million Series B in October 2024, led by imec.xpand with 18 institutional investors participating, funded the company's push toward clinical deployment. The company achieved a landmark milestone when it completed the first human implantation of a graphene-based brain-computer interface at Salford Royal Hospital in the United Kingdom — a watershed moment for graphene neurotechnology, as reported by BusinessWire. INBRAIN has also secured FDA Breakthrough Device Designation, enabling accelerated regulatory review in the United States.

Strategic partnerships with Microsoft (AI-driven neurotechnology) and Merck KGaA (clinical development) position INBRAIN at the intersection of nanotechnology and neuroscience — two fields experiencing exponential investment growth. As we explored in our neuroscience market analysis, brain-computer interface technologies represent one of the most transformative applications of nanoscale engineering in healthcare.

7. Kiutra — €30 Million+ Raised

Kiutra, founded in 2018 in Munich, Germany, has raised over €30 million in combined private and public funding to develop helium-3-free magnetic cooling systems for quantum computing and advanced research applications. The company's technology uses adiabatic demagnetisation refrigeration (ADR) — a process that achieves sub-kelvin temperatures by magnetising and demagnetising solid-state nanomaterials — replacing scarce helium-3, which NATO and the EU have flagged as a critical supply chain risk for quantum computing infrastructure.

Kiutra's €13 million Series A in October 2025, co-led by NovaCapital and 55 North (the world's largest pure-play quantum investment fund), with existing investors High-Tech Gründerfonds, TRUMPF Venture, Verve Ventures, and Intel Ignite participating, validates the company's transition from R&D startup to industrial scale-up. As Carlo Germano Ravina of NovaCapital stated, "kiutra's scalable magnetic cooling technology is not only foundational for quantum tech but also exemplifies the kind of deep tech leadership Europe needs," according to the company's official announcement.

With products including the S-Type Essential (rack-mountable cryogenic platform), S-Type Optical (sub-kelvin cryostat with optical access), and L-Type Rapid (top-loading cryostat for fast analysis), Kiutra serves leading research institutions, quantum startups, and corporate laboratories globally. The company's 60+ employees are building what amounts to critical infrastructure for the quantum computing industry — if quantum computers are to scale beyond laboratory prototypes, they require reliable, scalable, and affordable cooling systems that do not depend on a geopolitically constrained isotope.

8. Elixira — Seed Stage

Elixira, founded in 2025 in Stockholm, Sweden, is developing an AI-guided nanobot platform targeting cancer prevention — one of the most ambitious applications of nanotechnology in healthcare. The company represents a new wave of Swedish nanotechnology ventures leveraging the country's strong tradition in biotechnology research and its proximity to world-class institutions including the Karolinska Institute and the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH). While still at the seed stage, Elixira's approach to using autonomous nanoscale devices to monitor and intervene in biological processes at the cellular level positions it at the vanguard of preventive nanomedicine.

The concept of AI-guided nanobots combines two exponential technology curves: the miniaturisation of mechanical and electronic systems to nanometre dimensions, and the increasing sophistication of artificial intelligence in pattern recognition and decision-making. Elixira's platform envisions nanoscale devices capable of navigating the human bloodstream, identifying pre-cancerous cellular changes using onboard AI algorithms, and delivering targeted interventions before tumours can form. While commercialisation timelines for such technologies remain measured in years rather than quarters, the potential market impact is transformative — cancer treatment represents a $200+ billion global market, and a shift from treatment to prevention would fundamentally restructure healthcare economics.

9. Nanize — Early Stage

Nanize, founded in 2019 in Narvik, Norway, develops PFAS-free polysilazane-based nano-coatings designed to replace Teflon and other fluorinated compounds across cookware, automotive, aerospace, electronics, medical devices, and renewable energy applications. The company's coatings achieve ultra-low friction — lower than Teflon — while being FDA-compliant and free from per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), the so-called "forever chemicals" facing regulatory bans across the European Union and United States. Backed by Norwegian investor Valinor, Nanize operates at the intersection of nanotechnology and regulatory compliance, positioned to capture market share as PFAS bans reshape the $8+ billion global coatings industry.

Nanize's core technical achievement is remarkable: its polysilazane-based coatings cure fully in just 30 seconds at 70°C without catalysts, covalently bonding to substrates including metals, plastics, and glass to create transparent, durable, glass-like finishes. Applications range from non-stick cookware and anti-graffiti surfaces to solar panel coatings and wind turbine blade protection. The EU's proposed universal PFAS restriction, expected to affect over 10,000 substances, creates a regulatory tailwind that could accelerate adoption of Nanize's alternatives across multiple industries simultaneously. For a company with fewer than 10 employees, the addressable market created by PFAS regulation represents an outsized opportunity.

10. Morphle Labs — $5 Million+ Raised

Morphle Labs, founded in 2020 in San Francisco, develops AI-powered digital pathology solutions that leverage nanoscale imaging to transform disease diagnostics. The company secured $5 million in Series A funding in November 2025, as reported by TechStartups, to scale its platform that combines high-resolution microscopy at near-nanometre scales with machine learning algorithms trained on millions of pathology slides. The technology enables pathologists to analyse tissue samples with greater speed, accuracy, and consistency than conventional manual microscopy.

Morphle Labs exemplifies the trend of nanotechnology-adjacent startups that apply nanoscale imaging and measurement capabilities to solve practical healthcare challenges. While the company does not manufacture nanomaterials or nanodevices, its platform depends on optical systems operating at the diffraction limit of visible light — nanometre-scale resolution that enables the identification of cellular abnormalities invisible to lower-resolution imaging systems. The digital pathology market is projected to reach $14.7 billion by 2030, driven by laboratory consolidation, pathologist shortages, and the demonstrated superiority of AI-assisted diagnostics in detecting early-stage cancers.

Technologies and Forces Driving the Nanotechnology Startup Boom

Three converging forces are accelerating the nanotechnology startup ecosystem beyond historical growth rates. First, artificial intelligence has fundamentally transformed nanoscale research and development. AI-driven materials discovery platforms can simulate the properties of novel nanomaterials before physical synthesis, compressing timelines from years to months. Companies like Cellino and Elixira are embedding AI directly into their nanotechnology platforms, creating closed-loop systems where machine learning algorithms guide nanoscale interventions in real time. According to Grand View Research, the fusion of AI with nanotechnology is enhancing targeted treatment capabilities across healthcare, minimising side effects and improving patient outcomes.

Second, the energy transition is creating unprecedented demand for nanoscale battery materials. The electric vehicle battery market alone is projected to exceed $200 billion by 2030, and silicon-anode technologies developed by companies like Sila and Group14 address the single largest performance limitation of current lithium-ion batteries. The fact that the two largest nanotechnology startup funding rounds in 2024-2025 — Group14's $463 million Series D and Sila's $375 million Series G — both targeted battery nanomaterials underscores the market's conviction that this application will drive the sector's near-term commercialisation.

Third, quantum computing's maturation from laboratory curiosity to commercial infrastructure is generating demand for enabling nanotechnologies. Kiutra's cryogenic cooling systems, INBRAIN's graphene-based neural interfaces, and Axelera's nanoscale chip architectures all address infrastructure requirements for the quantum and AI computing paradigms that are reshaping the technology landscape. The quantum computing market is projected to reach $65 billion by 2030, creating a substantial addressable market for nanotechnology enablers.

Nanotechnology Market Statistics — Investment and Growth Forecasts

Nanotechnology Market and Investment Statistics 2024-2030

Metric	Value	Year/Period	Source
Global Nanotechnology Market Size (Projected)	$248.56 billion	2030	Fortune Business Insights
Market CAGR	17.8%	2023-2030	Fortune Business Insights
Total Nanotech Funding Rounds Completed	12,000+	Cumulative	Tracxn
Active Investors in Nanotech	6,500+	2025	Tracxn
Average Funding Round Size	$12.5 million	2024-2025	Tracxn
US Nanotechnology Startups	1,147	2025	Tracxn
US Funded Nanotech Startups	664	2025	Tracxn
US Series A+ Nanotech Startups	288	2025	Tracxn
Global Nanotech Employees	470,000+	2025	Industry estimates
Annual Hiring Growth Rate	6.03%	2025	Industry estimates

Why This Matters

The nanotechnology startup ecosystem in 2026 represents a maturation point where decades of fundamental research are translating into commercially viable products at industrial scale. For investors, the sector offers diversified exposure to multiple secular growth themes: the $200+ billion EV battery market (Sila, Group14), the $65 billion quantum computing infrastructure market (Kiutra), the $50+ billion brain-computer interface and neurotechnology market (INBRAIN), the $14.7 billion digital pathology market (Morphle Labs), and the $8+ billion coatings market undergoing regulatory disruption (Nanize). The concentration of funding in battery nanotechnology reflects near-term commercialisation timelines, while earlier-stage investments in neural interfaces, quantum cooling, and AI-guided nanobots signal longer-term bets on transformative applications.

For corporate strategists, the startups profiled in this analysis represent both competitive threats and partnership opportunities. Moleaer's 4,000+ installations across 55 countries demonstrate that nanotechnology can achieve rapid commercial deployment when the value proposition — improved water quality and efficiency — is immediately measurable. Conversely, Cellino's hospital-based manufacturing model could disrupt the centralised cell therapy production paradigm that pharmaceutical incumbents have invested billions to establish. Understanding which nanotechnology startups are approaching commercial inflection points is essential for strategic planning across automotive, healthcare, semiconductor, energy, and agricultural industries.

What Comes Next (12-36 Month Outlook)

Over the next 12 to 36 months, the nanotechnology startup landscape will be shaped by several critical developments. Sila Nanotechnologies and Group14 Technologies are both scheduled to begin commercial-scale production at their Moses Lake, Washington facilities, creating the first real test of whether silicon-anode and silicon-carbon composite materials can achieve the yield rates, consistency, and cost points required for automotive-grade battery production. The success or failure of these manufacturing ramp-ups will have outsized implications for the entire battery nanotechnology investment thesis.

In healthcare, INBRAIN Neuroelectronics is expected to advance its graphene BCI through additional human clinical trials following the Salford Royal Hospital milestone, while Cellino's Mass General Hospital partnership will provide initial data on the viability of hospital-based personalised cell therapy manufacturing. Both programmes represent critical proof points for nanotechnology's role in next-generation medical interventions.

Axelera AI's pursuit of €150 million+ in additional funding and the development of its Titania chiplet will test whether European semiconductor startups can compete with established Asian and American chip manufacturers at nanoscale process nodes. Kiutra's transition from R&D to industrial-scale cryogenic cooling deployment will determine whether helium-3-free systems can meet the reliability and performance requirements of commercial quantum computing installations.

Regulatory developments, particularly the EU's universal PFAS restriction and evolving nanomaterial safety frameworks, will create both opportunities and constraints for startups across the sector. Companies like Nanize that offer compliant alternatives to regulated substances may experience accelerated adoption, while startups deploying novel nanomaterials in healthcare will face increasing scrutiny from the FDA, EMA, and other regulatory bodies. It is important to note that all projections carry uncertainty and depend on market conditions, regulatory outcomes, and the inherent technical risks of commercialising nanoscale technologies.

Disclosure: Business 2.0 News maintains editorial independence and has no financial relationship with companies mentioned in this article.

References

• Fortune Business Insights — Nanotechnology Market Forecast
• Sila Nanotechnologies — Series G Announcement
• GeekWire — Group14 Technologies Series D
• Axelera AI — Series B Funding
• Fierce Pharma — Cellino ARPA-H Grant
• BusinessWire — INBRAIN Neuroelectronics Series B
• Kiutra — Series A Announcement
• TechStartups — Morphle Labs Series A
• Grand View Research — Nanotechnology Market
• Tracxn — Nanotechnology Startup Database
• Bloomberg — Sila Nanotechnologies Valuation
• TechFundingNews — Axelera AI Funding