Lyte, a Sunnyvale, California company that makes chips, sensors and software to help robots see, raised $165m in a Series C round announced on September 2, 2026. The round was led by Maverick Silicon and gave the company a post-money valuation of $1.6bn.
Fidelity Management & Research Company, which led Lyte's Series B, took part again. Atreides Management, Key1 Capital and Ora Global, formerly known as Exor Ventures, also invested, along with other existing and new backers that the company did not name.
The company said the round brought its total funding since it was founded in 2021 to $272m. Andrew Homan, a managing partner at Maverick Silicon, joined Lyte's board as part of the deal.
“Physical AI has a sensing problem before it has a model problem. A robot cannot act safely on data that does not faithfully describe the world.”Alexander Shpunt, CEO and Co-Founder, Lyte
What Lyte does
Lyte builds what it describes as the full perception stack for robots, from custom silicon up to the spatial data that robotic systems use to work out where they are and what is moving around them. Its main product, LyteVision, combines 4D coherent vision, high-resolution imaging and inertial sensing on a single synchronised timeline.
Instead of relying on software to piece together position and motion from separate sensors, Lyte said its own chips measure those properties directly. Globes described the hardware as sensor chips that bring together a camera, an inertial motion sensor and a sensor that measures distance and speed, aimed at humanoid and industrial robots.
LyteVision was named CES 2026 Best of Innovation in Robotics. The company came out of stealth in January 2026 and said it has since entered production and started shipping to robotics customers in inspection, logistics and manufacturing. It did not name those customers.
Chief executive Alexander Shpunt said the problem facing physical AI starts with sensing rather than with models. "A robot cannot act safely on data that does not faithfully describe the world," he said in the announcement.
Who is behind the company
Lyte was founded by former Apple and PrimeSense engineers. PrimeSense, the 3D-sensing company that Apple acquired, supplied technology used in Microsoft's Kinect, and the founders' work later fed into technologies behind Apple's Face ID. Shpunt is co-founder and chief executive, and chip entrepreneur Avigdor Willenz is chairman.
According to Globes, Lyte has about 120 employees, most of them in Silicon Valley, and has no offices in Israel. Globes named Arman Hajati as chief technology officer and Yuval Gerson as vice president of engineering.
Willenz said in the announcement that owning the silicon is what separates companies that define a category from those that only take part in one.
What the money is for
Lyte said it will use the Series C to scale production of its sensing silicon and the LyteVision platform, to develop its AI and perception capabilities further, and to expand deployments with robotics companies and industrial customers.
The company also plans to grow its workforce substantially over the next year, hiring in silicon, software, optics, manufacturing, operations and go-to-market roles, including senior leadership positions.
Homan said the range of early customer demand had strengthened Maverick Silicon's view of the company. He described Lyte as a foundational sensing platform that lets many kinds of robots perceive and understand their surroundings.
The funding so far
Lyte has not published a full breakdown of its earlier rounds. The company said Fidelity led its Series B but did not give the amount or date. With the new round, total funding reached $272m, which implies about $107m raised before the Series C.
Lyte did not disclose revenue, the number of customers or how many LyteVision units it has shipped. SiliconANGLE noted that the company had emerged from stealth only in January 2026, eight months before the Series C was announced.
Company website: lyte.ai