Vilnius-based LITILIT raises €8 million to scale up femtosecond laser production
Lithuanian company LITILIT has secured an €8 million loan from national development bank ILTE to build a modular femtosecond laser system. Commercialisation is planned for the second half of 2029.
LITILIT, a company based in Vilnius, has secured an €8 million loan from the Lithuanian National Development Bank ILTE to develop a new modular femtosecond laser system called FEMODA. The total project is valued at €10 million, with commercialisation of the technology targeted for the second half of 2029.
The company recently started construction on a large-scale femtosecond laser facility in Vilnius. CEO Nikolajus Gavrilinas said the new system would significantly widen the range of applications for femtosecond lasers. While such lasers are currently used mainly for manufacturing high-value small parts, the new system is meant to enable use in large-scale industries, such as mass production of metal tools or applying specialised coatings to large surfaces like aircraft or car bodies.
The technology behind it
Founded in 2015, LITILIT builds lasers based on patented technology developed by co-founders Kęstutis Regelskis, Nerijus Rusteika and Gavrilinas, working closely with the Centre for Physical Sciences and Technology (FTMC) in Vilnius. Femtosecond lasers use extremely short pulses to process materials without damaging surrounding structures — a property known as cold ablation — making them valuable in fields such as eye surgery, vascular stents and chip manufacturing.
Gavrilinas noted that wider adoption of femtosecond laser systems has been held back by heavy infrastructure needs, including water cooling and sensitive optics that require a temperature-controlled environment. The new modular platform combines control electronics, optics and cooling into a single industrial unit designed to be less sensitive to temperature, humidity and vibration, with modules that can be replaced individually if one fails.
FEMODA is targeting an average optical power of up to 1000 W, split across 10 to 20 separate beam channels. A new high-capacity laser factory in Vilnius, construction of which began in June, is set to start operations this autumn and aims to produce 3,000 femtosecond lasers per year. Besides the loan, the €10 million project is financed by a €2 million investment from LITILIT itself.
