AraLight Antes Up For Another $30M

Less than two months after sealing its Series A deal, AraLight Inc. is back in the private equity pool again.

In March, the Monroe Township, N.J.-based optical networking play landed $10 million (See PEW 3/26, pg. 1); now it has upped the stakes and is looking for an additional $30 million to flesh out its business development plans, said Gary Ger, a company spokesman.

Exactly who the company?s Series B buyers will be is still up in the air, as AraLight is currently shopping the deal to investors. When asked if the company had approached Series A lead Ridgewood Capital, however, neither Ger nor the VC firm had any comment.

Although AraLight has no hard or fast timeframe in mind for its fund-raising efforts, Ger said the deal could close in as few as six weeks. Once it has the capital in hand, the company intends to expand its product manufacturing capabilities and ramp up its sales staff, he added.

AraLight, which makes optoelectronic chips that help convert analog optical signals to digital, was spun out of Lucent Technologies? Bell Labs group in September 1999.

The company?s current backers include Signal Lake, Solar Venture Partners and Lucent.

Contact Robyn Kurdek: Robyn.Kurdek@tfn.com