SCVC backs pioneering optical sensor startup PhovIR in £4 million seed round
Science Creates’ investment arm has welcomed University of Manchester spinout PhovIR to its investment portfolio, backing the company in an oversubscribed £4 million seed round co-led alongside Northern Gritstone.
SCVC, Science Creates’ investment arm and award-winning Deep Tech VC, has welcomed University of Manchester spinout PhovIR to its investment portfolio, backing the company in an oversubscribed £4 million seed round co-led alongside Northern Gritstone.
PhovIR uses its breakthrough Near Infra-Red (NIR) optical sensor technology to identify the “optical fingerprint” of the constituents of solids, liquids and gases, in a miniature device of just 4x4 mm — about the size of a peppercorn — which enables its integration into portable devices like smartphones or wearables.
While the human eye perceives a very narrow band of the optical spectrum — predominantly colours — the NIR spectrum contains much more information about materials and substances, allowing them to be characterised by their unique optical signature.
Although other NIR sensor devices exist, they are bulky, expensive to manufacture and difficult to integrate into compact technologies. PhovIR’s breakthrough allows the sensor to be manufactured on a silicon chip — resulting in a small, lightweight and cost-effective solution for chemical sensing that can be incorporated into portable devices.
This advancement opens up a wide range of potential applications — both industrial and consumer-facing — across sectors including healthcare (e.g. diagnostics and personalised medicine), agriculture (e.g. crop monitoring and soil analysis), food and drink (e.g. quality control and contamination detection), and environmental monitoring (e.g. air and water quality), all enabled by integration into everyday technologies.
Dr Tim Echtermeyer, CTO of PhovIR, explains:
"PhovIR's technology will enable you to identify how fresh a fruit is or whether it is contaminated with pesticides, or if the clothes you are buying are made of the stated materials, by scanning them with your smartphone. It will make food consumption safer by detecting whether your meal might contain substances detrimental to you or whether your drink has been spiked. PhovIR aims to deliver personalised air quality and pollution monitoring in cities by delivering a real-time map of pollution in your environment and hence optimise control. Ultimately, we envisage complementing portable devices and wearables with capabilities that allow point-of-care diagnostics, e.g. supporting remote GP appointments with real-time measurements."
PhovIR’s sensing solution is based on MEMS (Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems) technology, which captures a broader optical range. Its fully configurable software replicates the functionality of multiple sensors and can be manufactured at scale.
John Williams, SCVC General Partner, said:
“PhovIR represents the future of Deep Tech: advanced hardware, unlocked by AI. It’s the kind of multi-tech breakthrough that creates entirely new categories — and the kind SCVC is here to back.”
The company was spun out of the University of Manchester by Dr Tim Echtermeyer, based at the Graphene Engineering Innovation Centre (GEIC). Dr Echtermeyer is joined by Dr Steve Turley as Executive Chair, who brings over 25 years of experience scaling complex technologies into high-growth businesses, including as Chair of Effect Photonics and former CEO of Perpetuum.
With the funding, PhovIR plans to bring its first commercial product to market, grow its team, and continue delivering on its vision of making the invisible visible to improve human and planetary health.
Dr Tim Echtermeyer adds:
“I am exhilarated to enter the next part of PhovIR’s journey and turn our vision into reality. I am grateful to the many people contributing and making this happen; particularly Steve, and William Wren and Minh Vu from the engineering team, who have worked relentlessly.”
Dr Steve Turley, Chair of PhovIR, said:
“I am very excited to be working with PhovIR not only because of the immense potential that the technology has but also the great team in Manchester led by Tim. It’s an opportunity to demonstrate that the UK can take excellent innovative technology and turn it into a global success story.”
SCVC is Science Creates' investment arm, specialised in early-stage Deep Tech companies in the UK. We support with investment from pre-seed to series A, using our ‘technology-product fit’ model to guide teams through technical and commercial de-risking.
