Gixel raises €5M to advance AI and AR wearable tech
German startup Gixel’s optical engine delivers smartphone-level image quality in a form factor small enough for normal-looking glasses—without the compromises of waveguides. Designed for all-day wear, Gixel’s tech is more power-efficient, scalable and future-proof.
German startup Gixel has successfully closed a €5 million seed funding round to advance optical display technology for AI and AR glasses.
The oversubscribed round was led by Oculus VR co-founder Brendan Iribe; former Chief Futurist at 20th Century Fox and Paramount, and founding team member at RED Digital Cinema, Ted Schilowitz; FlixBus founders Jochen Engert, Daniel Kraus, and André Schwämmlein; Germany’s Federal Agency for Disruptive Innovation (SPRIND); and early-stage VC firm LEA Partners, Gixel said in a media release.
“As a Futurist at two major movie studios, I’ve seen countless wearable display concepts. Gixel’s team and approach stand out for their real advances in resolution, form factor, and usability — they’re the one to watch,” said Ted Schilowitz, former Chief Futurist at 20th Century Fox and Paramount and founding team member at RED Digital Cinema.
As the rapid development of AI‘s vision and voice capabilities has accelerated the global tech giants‘ race for mainstream AI and AR eyewear, ultra-light, power-efficient, high-fidelity optical see-through displays remain the industry’s biggest barrier. Gixel’s proprietary architecture is designed to break that bottleneck — delivering a modular solution built for AI glasses today and scaling to tomorrow’s full-lens immersive AR with fields of view as large as the lenses themselves.
Gixel’s approach enables optical see-through displays with smartphone-level quality, stellar transparency when the display is off, and energy-efficient, low-weight, low-heat operation. Designed for industrial-scale manufacturing, it supports curved lenses for sleek form factors, variable focal planes for correct depth placement, and a scalable field of view — from small zones to the entire lens. Its scalable design gives OEMs freedom to choose field of view and place displays anywhere on the lens, the media release said.
“We’re not just solving display challenges—we’re making the breakthrough that finally makes wearable AI and AR real,” said Felix Nienstaedt, co-founder and CEO of Gixel.