French chipmaker NanoXplore raises €20 million to expand into defence…

Team S · 2026-01-02T09:32:59.000Z

French fabless semiconductor company NanoXplore has secured €20 million in new funding to accelerate the expansion of its advanced microelectronics business into the defence sector and to support strategic growth initiatives aimed at bolstering Europe’s electronic sovereignty amid rising global technology competition. The round was backed by leading European defence contractor MBDA and the Defence Innovation Fund, managed by France’s state investment bank Bpifrance, highlighting institutional and industrial confidence in NanoXplore’s technology and strategic role in the semiconductor supply chain. Under the terms of the funding arrangement, MBDA will contribute industrial expertise and insights into defence needs, while the Defence Innovation Fund will align its investment with broader policy goals of strengthening France’s and Europe’s technological autonomy in critical microelectronics. NanoXplore’s CEO Édouard Lepape emphasised that the fresh capital will enable the company to deepen its footprint in defence markets by developing a new generation of secure, high-reliability components tailored for land, air and naval systems. The investment not only strengthens NanoXplore’s capacity to serve high-value sectors but also contributes to Europe’s broader effort to reduce dependency on non-European semiconductor technologies and reinforce its electronic sovereignty as geopolitical tensions and supply chain risks increase. Founded in 2013, NanoXplore is a family-owned fabless IC design company specialised in radiation-hardened programmable integrated circuits, including FPGAs (Field Programmable Gate Arrays) capable of operating reliably under extreme conditions such as space missions and defence platforms. Its products are designed and developed with a 100 % European supply chain, allowing the company to offer components free from U.S. defence export controls such as ITAR—positioning NanoXplore as a sovereign alternative to non-European chips in strategic applications. #semiconductors #NanoXplore #defencetech #electronics #EuropeanSovereignty #fundingnews #chipmaking #rad-hard #microelectronics #Fabless #strategicgrowth #techinnovation #hardware #EUindustry

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French chipmaker NanoXplore raises €20 million to expand into defence… | Newnex