In the July-August issue of Optics & Photonics News (OPN, Optica), a biennial review was published titled Entrepreneurs to Watch 2025 — highlighting 10 entrepreneurs in the field of optics and photonics whose work is worth following in the coming months. Among those recognized was Dr. Eng. Karolina Orłowska, co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Gekko Photonics.
This is a significant moment for us — an external, industry validation of the direction in which we are building Raman spectroscopy for the chemical industry. Optica, as one of the world's largest optical societies (operating under the name OSA until 2021), reports on 10 individuals from the entire photonics ecosystem — not only from the USA and Western Europe. Polish representation in this selection is rare. Gekko Photonics is a member of Optica — so this recognition has two dimensions for us: external validation of our direction and acknowledgment from the community of which we are a part.
What exactly did Optica write?
The article „Entrepreneurs to Watch 2025: Karolina Orłowska” (OPN, July 25, 2025) describes Karolina’s scientific and business journey in three chapters:
- Scientific Foundation — physics at Wrocław University of Science and Technology, a PhD in optical force metrology, and prior work with Raman in biomedical photonics.
- Founding of Gekko Photonics (2019) — together with three co-founders from Wrocław University of Science and Technology, a team built on multidisciplinary expertise (optics, electronics, mechanics, chemistry, software).
- Pivot to Industry (2022) — transition from biomedical applications to process chemistry, investor validation, and the first client from the chemical industry.
The central quote from the article describes what the Spectrally:
„platform does today: ”We’re translating the Raman language. Instead of giving users a plot, we give them a number.”
— Dr. Eng. Karolina Orłowska, OPN, July 2025(„Tłumaczymy język Ramana. Zamiast wykresu — dajemy klientowi konkretną liczbę.”)
This sentence accurately reflects the philosophy of our product: the Raman spectrum is a physical signal; what the client on the production floor needs are concentrations, reaction rates, mixing indicators — clear decision-making values, not raw spectra. That is why we always build the Spectrally X1 family as hardware + chemometric model + integration with DCS/MES, not just a standalone analyzer.
What does Karolina do at Gekko Photonics?
As CSO, Karolina leads the R&D area at Gekko: physical concepts, optical architecture of probes and spectrometers, validation of chemometric models, and the pathway for transferring academic results to industrial conditions. She represents the company scientifically — she lectures at Wrocław University of Science and Technology (starting February 2026), represented Wrocław and Lower Silesia at EXPO 2025 Osaka in the Polish Pavilion (June 2025), and was a finalist in the Tech Contest „Made in Wrocław” 2024..
In Optica, the article highlights the organizational culture that Karolina co-creates: an emphasis on multidisciplinary competence exchange within the team and on translating advanced physics into the language of process engineers and chemists — users who do not need to understand the theory of inelastic scattering to use the technology.
What’s next — plans mentioned by Optica
OPN concludes that Gekko intends to further scale the chemical division — this is the area where we currently have the greatest traction (phenol-formaldehyde and urea resins, cosmetics and detergents, fertilizers, adhesives, hydrocarbons). Karolina also indicates two directions she wishes to revisit in the medium term: SERS for applications with extremely low concentrations and measurements of trace environmental pollutants, including microplastics. Both topics align well with what Spectrally is today — a platform that can be adapted to new classes of analytes as the library of chemometric models grows with additional applications.
Other Recognitions 2024–2025
The recognition in Optica is part of a sequence of industry acknowledgments for Karolina and Gekko Photonics in recent quarters:
- Optica Entrepreneurs to Watch 2025 — a review of 10 photonics entrepreneurs, OPN, July 2025.
- ICO Emerging Innovator — recognition from the International Commission for Optics for young leaders in applied optics research.
- EXPO 2025 Osaka, Polish Pavilion — representation of Wrocław and Lower Silesia, June 2025.
- Tech Contest „Made in Wrocław” 2024. — finalist of the Wrocław deep-tech ecosystem competition, October 2024.
Why this matters for our clients
From the perspective of the production, R&D, and maintenance teams we work with daily, such recognitions are primarily a form of tangible validation: the technology you are considering implementing in your reactor has a solid scientific foundation and international recognition. In practical engineering terms, this means that the Spectrally X1 family (LAB, LAB+, PORTABLE, INLINE, PROBE, and the layer Spectrally OS) was not developed as a fast-follow market product — it was designed from the physics of the signal side by scientists who previously developed Raman instrumentation in an academic environment.
On the operational side, Gekko is compact: 7 key personnel, including four co-founders from Wrocław University of Science and Technology (Robert Stachurski — CEO, Bartosz Kawa — CTO, Karolina Orłowska — CSO, Dariusz Gajewicz — COO), a team of 11–50 people, with production and service in Poland. The full chain: feasibility on client samples → product configuration → chemometric models → integration with DCS/MES/SCADA → model maintenance over time. This delivery model — full-stack, engineering-first — is also an element that Karolina describes in the article.
FAQ — Frequently Asked Questions About the Recognition
What is Optica Entrepreneurs to Watch?
This is a biennial recognition published by Optics & Photonics News — the magazine of Optica (formerly OSA until 2021), one of the world's largest optical societies. In the 2025 edition, the editorial board selected 10 entrepreneurs in the field of optics and photonics whose work is worth following in the coming months.
Who is Karolina Orłowska?
Co-founder and CSO of Gekko Photonics, a physicist from Wrocław University of Science and Technology, with a PhD in optical force metrology. Co-creator of the Spectrally platform — a family of Raman analyzers for the chemical industry. The company’s representative in the scientific and industry sphere (Wrocław University of Science and Technology, EXPO 2025 Osaka, ICO Emerging Innovator).
What does Gekko Photonics build?
The family of process Raman analyzers Spectrally X1 (INLINE, LAB / LAB+, PORTABLE) with the immersion probe X1 PROBE and the self-cleaning Retractex component, plus the software layer Spectrally OS (PLS, PCA, CNN models, a library of ~28,000 reference spectra). The system translates Raman spectra in real time into specific process values: analyte concentrations, reaction end-points, mixing indicators.
In which industries does Gekko have the most implementations?
We have the most implementations in process chemistry: phenolic and urea-formaldehyde resins, cosmetics and detergents (SLES, glycerin), fertilizers (urea, biuret, UAN, AdBlue), adhesives, hydrocarbons, and wastewater monitoring. Average implementation time is 3–5.5 months, average ROI is 6–10 months under industrial conditions.
Is Optica OPN a peer-reviewed source?
Optics & Photonics News It is the official industry magazine of Optica — it is not a peer-reviewed journal in the classical scientific sense, but the editorial board conducts its own selection and verification, and its industry reach is global. The list Entrepreneurs to Watch is published every two years based on nominations and editorial selection.
What's next
At Gekko Photonics, we treat recognition in Optica as a strong reference point in conversations with R&D and production teams considering the implementation of process Raman spectroscopy — but it does not change how we start every project. Feasibility-first on client samples remains step zero: typically 10 business days from sample delivery to a feasibility assessment report and measurement architecture proposal. Contact Us, if you would like to discuss a specific application — or take a look at the application database in our knowledge base.
Full Optica OPN article: Entrepreneurs to Watch 2025: Karolina Orłowska.