Metalenz Launches Polar ID Enabling Simple, Secure Face Unlock for Smartphones
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About Us

We are a fabless semiconductor optics company on a mission to revolutionize optical sensing and empower billions of devices with new information. Using our metasurface (metalens) technology, we are changing the way that people and machines interact with and understand the world.

Company Highlights

2025
  • Polar ID under evaluation with top OEMs
  • STMicroelectronics and Metalenz Sign a New License Agreement to Accelerate Metasurface Optics Adoption,
    • First generation meta-optics pass 140 million in market milestone
  • Metalenz expands product and patent portfolio, which now encompasses metasurface technology and system level applications for secure biometrics, supporting product innovations that simplify and improve 3D depth sensing, such as single element dot pattern projectors.
2024
  • Metalenz demonstrates Polar ID live at MWC Barcelona
  • Metalenz confirms Samsung ISOCELL Vizion image sensor as light-engine for Polar ID, the world’s smallest, most affordable and secure face unlock solution.
2023
  • Metalenz launches its metasurface optics on the open market in partnership with UMC
  • Metalenz announces Polar ID running on Qualcomm Snapdragon®, enabling simple, secure face unlock for smartphones.
2022
  • Parts pass module-level reliability for top OEM
  • Portfolio expands to polarized optics w/ launch of PolarEyes™ sensing & Gemini™ Illuminators
  • World’s first metalens product in mass production with STMicroelectronics
2021
  • Orion™ dot pattern projectors announced
  • STMicroelectronics partnership announced
  • High volume production ready metalens technology
  • Designed-in, Time-of-flight reference platform
2020
  • Single metasurface imaging invented by Metalenz
  • Metalenz moves HQ to downtown Boston
2018
  • First high-volume manufacturing demonstration wafers
2016
  • Metalenz founded by Rob Devlin & Federico Capasso
  • First capture of high-quality images with metasurfaces at Cambridge office
  • Metalenz secures exclusive license to Harvard IP

Our Team

We are on a mission to make smart sensing and new information accessible to billions of people and devices, changing the way people interact with the world. This is our focus and our passion.

We are a team that values critical and creative thinking and encourages new ideas and complex problem solving.
We work hard, we celebrate.

We are proud to have cultivated an environment of constant collaboration and mutual respect- with egos left at the door.
Built on foundational research from the Capasso Lab at Harvard University.

Built on foundational research from the Capasso Lab at Harvard University.

Metalenz emerged out of stealth in 2021 to become the first company to commercialize meta-optics.
Marking the beginning of this revolutionary optical technology in real-world devices, Metalenz launched meta-optics (metalenses) into consumer devices for the first time in 2022 in a range of consumer devices through its partnership with global semiconductor manufacturing leader STMicroelectronics.
Whether in our smartphones, our car, or medical devices, meta-optics can access whole new sets of information that conventional optics can’t. Our breakthrough technology improves performance with simpler, smaller modules, allowing powerful new sensing capabilities to proliferate to more devices, and impact more lives. We work directly with OEMs, as well as system integrators and image sensing companies.

Latest News

Press Release
08 | 18 | 2025

Metalenz Expands Its Technologies in the Metasurface Market to Include System Level Sensing Applications

Press Release
07 | 10 | 2025

STMicroelectronics and Metalenz Sign a New License Agreement to Accelerate Metasurface Optics Adoption

Press Release
02 | 13 | 2025

Optica Names Rob Devlin the 2025 Kevin P. Thompson Optical Design Innovator Award Recipient

Press Release
09 | 26 | 2024

Smartphone Security Drives Android Users to Switch, US Consumer Sentiment Report Shows

Press Release
06 | 10 | 2024

Metalenz Announces Key Leadership Appointments as Company Readies Polar ID for Mass Production.

Press Release
02 | 26 | 2024

Metalenz Confirms Samsung ISOCELL Vizion Image Sensor as Light- Engine for Polar ID, the World’s Smallest, Most Affordable and Secure Face Unlock Solution.