Latest news with #Volantis
USA Today
5 days ago
- Sport
- USA Today
Dylan Volantis named Baseball America National Freshman of the Year
best freshman in the country 🤘#HookEm | @DylanVolantis | @BaseballAmerica During the 2025 campaign, Dylan Volantis was one of the best pitchers in college baseball. Due to his play, he has been busy adding to his trophy case the last few weeks. That continued on Friday when the Longhorns star was named the National Freshman of the Year by Baseball America. In his first year of college baseball, Volantis was dominant every time out. Volantis led all rookies nationally in saves with 12. He also posted a 1.94 ERA while holding opponents to a .185 batting average. The Westlake High School product showed a talent for missing bats, adding 74 strikeouts to his resume. Additionally, Volantis was stellar in conference play. Against SEC teams, he posted a 1.59 ERA and recorded 11 saves. That is partly why awards have been rolling since the regular season ended. His haul includes All-American honors and recognition from the American Baseball Coaches Association/Rawlings. With his latest hardware, Volantis has made history. He is the fourth player in program history to be named the National Freshman of the Year. The only other players on that list are Greg Swindell, Kirk Dressendorfer, and Brooks Kieschnick. Before Volantis, Kieschnick was the latest Longhorns player to take home the honors back in 1991. Following a stellar season, expectations will be higher than ever for Volantis during his sophomore campaign. He has shown last that he has the potential to be one of the best pitchers in the nation, and that should continue now that the Longhorns star has one year of experience under his belt.
Associated Press
12-06-2025
- Business
- Associated Press
Volantis Unveils Photonic Compute Platform for the AI Era; Raises $9M in Seed Round With Alex Wang, Trevor Blackwell, and Others
SAN MATEO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jun 12, 2025-- Volantis, a semiconductor startup building photonically integrated computers for the AI era, today emerged from stealth and announced a $9 million seed round of funding. The round includes backing from Alex Wang (Scale AI) and Trevor Blackwell (Y Combinator). Sam Altman backed Volantis in April 2022, betting on the need for foundational breakthroughs in compute long before today's AI infrastructure limitations came into focus. Founded in 2022, Volantis is the first company to scale a new class of photonic compute architecture that moves beyond the limitations of silicon photonics. Using a fundamentally different approach—direct laser modulation and wafer-scale integration—Volantis enables ultra-efficient communication across highly connected compute systems. This architecture packs the power of a server rack into a chip-scale package, reducing energy consumption and cost while dramatically increasing compute speed. 'We're not just making an incrementally better AI chip,' said Tapa Ghosh, Volantis' founder and CEO. 'We've solved long-standing challenges that have kept photonics out of computers. Instead of relying on silicon photonics, we've scaled a new class of low-cost, low-power, directly modulated lasers and coupled them into densely parallel optical waveguides—something never done at this scale before. The result is the photonic compute platform the AI era has been waiting for.' The core bottleneck in AI compute today is the bandwidth and power required to move data between chips. While photonics has long been seen as the answer, silicon photonics—the dominant approach for the past two decades—has consistently failed to scale inside systems. Volantis replaces traditional chip interconnects with energy-efficient optical channels, using parallelism to deliver high aggregate bandwidth with unmatched efficiency. Volantis' breakthrough comes from integrating directly modulated lasers with on-chip optical waveguides—a feat that enables many slow, low-powered links to work in parallel, similar to the architectural advantage GPUs have in compute. This unique combination allows Volantis to unlock 15x better performance per dollar while improving stability, and reducing power consumption. In just two years Volantis has already built working, patent-pending prototypes, validating that photonics inside the computer outperforms traditional silicon photonics. Clint Schow, a leading photonics researcher and professor at UCSB, and advisor to Volantis, added, 'This new approach takes proven, low-cost VCSEL technology and unleashes it at scale to deliver a wafer-scale AI processor. Volantis is not trying to retrofit today's chips; they're building what the next decade of compute will require.' The Volantis team brings together top optical and hardware engineering talent from companies like Ayar Labs, Lightmatter, Marvell, Rockley, Infinera, Lumentum, Juniper, Skorpios, and others. Roy Meade, co-founder and CTO of Volantis, was the first employee and former VP of Engineering at Ayar Labs, one of the most prominent silicon photonics companies globally; he also successfully led HBM (High Bandwidth Memory) development at Micron. Volantis will use the funding to continue refining its chip architecture, grow its world-class engineering team, and begin early customer engagements. About Volantis Volantis is a semiconductor startup building photonically integrated computers for the AI era. Founded in 2022 and backed by leading innovators in AI and computing, Volantis is the first to scale photonics inside computer chips, enabling a new class of chips that are radically faster, less expensive, and more energy efficient than traditional architectures. Volantis holds multiple pending patents on its architecture and is headquartered in San Mateo, CA. View source version on CONTACT: Press Contacts: Marie Moore 917-375-4790 [email protected] KEYWORD: UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA CALIFORNIA INDUSTRY KEYWORD: VENTURE CAPITAL FINANCE HARDWARE START-UP ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE PROFESSIONAL SERVICES TECHNOLOGY SEMICONDUCTOR SOURCE: Volantis Copyright Business Wire 2025. PUB: 06/12/2025 09:45 AM/DISC: 06/12/2025 09:45 AM
Business Wire
12-06-2025
- Business
- Business Wire
Volantis Unveils Photonic Compute Platform for the AI Era; Raises $9M in Seed Round With Alex Wang, Trevor Blackwell, and Others
SAN MATEO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Volantis, a semiconductor startup building photonically integrated computers for the AI era, today emerged from stealth and announced a $9 million seed round of funding. The round includes backing from Alex Wang (Scale AI) and Trevor Blackwell (Y Combinator). Sam Altman backed Volantis in April 2022, betting on the need for foundational breakthroughs in compute long before today's AI infrastructure limitations came into focus. Volantis is not trying to retrofit today's chips; they're building what the next decade of compute will require. Founded in 2022, Volantis is the first company to scale a new class of photonic compute architecture that moves beyond the limitations of silicon photonics. Using a fundamentally different approach—direct laser modulation and wafer-scale integration—Volantis enables ultra-efficient communication across highly connected compute systems. This architecture packs the power of a server rack into a chip-scale package, reducing energy consumption and cost while dramatically increasing compute speed. 'We're not just making an incrementally better AI chip,' said Tapa Ghosh, Volantis' founder and CEO. 'We've solved long-standing challenges that have kept photonics out of computers. Instead of relying on silicon photonics, we've scaled a new class of low-cost, low-power, directly modulated lasers and coupled them into densely parallel optical waveguides—something never done at this scale before. The result is the photonic compute platform the AI era has been waiting for.' The core bottleneck in AI compute today is the bandwidth and power required to move data between chips. While photonics has long been seen as the answer, silicon photonics—the dominant approach for the past two decades—has consistently failed to scale inside systems. Volantis replaces traditional chip interconnects with energy-efficient optical channels, using parallelism to deliver high aggregate bandwidth with unmatched efficiency. Volantis' breakthrough comes from integrating directly modulated lasers with on-chip optical waveguides—a feat that enables many slow, low-powered links to work in parallel, similar to the architectural advantage GPUs have in compute. This unique combination allows Volantis to unlock 15x better performance per dollar while improving stability, and reducing power consumption. In just two years Volantis has already built working, patent-pending prototypes, validating that photonics inside the computer outperforms traditional silicon photonics. Clint Schow, a leading photonics researcher and professor at UCSB, and advisor to Volantis, added, 'This new approach takes proven, low-cost VCSEL technology and unleashes it at scale to deliver a wafer-scale AI processor. Volantis is not trying to retrofit today's chips; they're building what the next decade of compute will require.' The Volantis team brings together top optical and hardware engineering talent from companies like Ayar Labs, Lightmatter, Marvell, Rockley, Infinera, Lumentum, Juniper, Skorpios, and others. Roy Meade, co-founder and CTO of Volantis, was the first employee and former VP of Engineering at Ayar Labs, one of the most prominent silicon photonics companies globally; he also successfully led HBM (High Bandwidth Memory) development at Micron. Volantis will use the funding to continue refining its chip architecture, grow its world-class engineering team, and begin early customer engagements. About Volantis Volantis is a semiconductor startup building photonically integrated computers for the AI era. Founded in 2022 and backed by leading innovators in AI and computing, Volantis is the first to scale photonics inside computer chips, enabling a new class of chips that are radically faster, less expensive, and more energy efficient than traditional architectures. Volantis holds multiple pending patents on its architecture and is headquartered in San Mateo, CA.
USA Today
12-06-2025
- Sport
- USA Today
Two Texas Longhorns earn spots on Perfect Game's Freshman All-American Team
Two Texas Longhorns earn spots on Perfect Game's Freshman All-American Team Longhorns stars Adrian Rodriguez and Dylan Volantis earn special honors During the 2025 campaign, Texas Longhorns baseball got contributions from everyone on the roster. While they were mainly led by upperclassmen, two freshmen, Adrian Rodriguez and Dylan Volantis, made their mark. The talented duo added to their trophy cases this week, earning Perfect Game Freshman All-America honors. In their freshman seasons, Rodriguez and Volantis showed they can be key pieces going forward. Volantis shined on the mound, while Rodriguez was a hits machine and welcoming source of consistency. With Volantis in the bullpen, Texas had one of the best relievers in the country. The California native posted a 1.94 ERA in 51 innings while striking out 74 batters. He also etched himself into the record books with 11 saves in conference play, tied for the most in SEC history. Due to his stellar play, he was named the National Freshman Pitcher of the Year by the Collegiate Baseball Writers Association. As Volantis excelled on the mound, Rodriguez was a human highlight reel with the bat. He finished the 2025 campaign with a .313 batting average and 23 RBI. He also showed off his speed with 15 stolen bases, tied for the team lead. The Flower Mound High school product also provided value with his versatility. He saw time at third base, designated hitter and got some reps in the outfield. That allowed the Longhorns to get his bat in the lineup, often in a tough SEC conference. Regardless of the position or opponent, Rodriguez was one of the Longhorns' best players. Volantis and Rodriguez also helped the Longhorns join unique company. They were one of three programs with multiple selections to Perfect Game's Freshman All-America team. While expectations will be higher next year, the Longhorns' future is bright, with Volantis and Rodriguez leading the way.
USA Today
10-06-2025
- Sport
- USA Today
Longhorns pitcher Dylan Volantis adds to his trophy case
Longhorns pitcher Dylan Volantis adds to his trophy case Dylan Volantis earns special recognition During the 2025 campaign, the Texas Longhorns were one of the best teams in the SEC. While they got plenty of impressive performances at the plate they also excelled on the mound. One player who stood out was left-hander Dylan Volantis, who established himself as one of the best relievers in the nation. In 51 innings, the Westlake High School product posted a 1.94 ERA while striking out 74 batters. The California native was nearly unhittable in his first college season, holding opponents to a .185 batting average. As Volantis thrived out of the Longhorns bullpen, he took on the closer role, adding 12 saves to his resume. Although it was only his first season, Volantis quickly earned the trust of Longhorns head coach Jim Schlossnagle. During the regular season, Schlossnagle called on his star reliever a team-high 23 times. Now that the regular season is in the books, Volantis is adding to his trophy case. Due to his play, Volantis earned Fresh All-American honors. It is only the first of many awards that the Westlake High School product should earn at Texas. Last month, he was named the SEC Freshman of the Year. His national recognition did not stop there, as Volantis was also a semifinalist for the Golden Spikes Award. While expectations for next year will be higher than ever, it is a challenge Volantis is ready to face. This past season, he pitched in one of the toughest conferences in the country and dominated. With one year of experience under his belt, Volantis should continue to improve as he looks to help the Longhorns end their title drought. For Longhorns fans, that is an exciting future to think about. Follow us on X/Twitter at @LonghornsWire
