CEOs from eight of Europe’s largest integrated photonics companies have presented a plan to
EU officials for building a European supply chain for photonic integrated circuits.

CEOs from eight of Europe’s largest integrated photonics companies have presented a plan to
EU officials for building a European supply chain for photonic integrated circuits.

The eight CEOs are: Rudi de Winter – CEO of XFAB; Johan Feenstra – CEO of SMART Photonics; Felix Grawert – CEO of Aixtron; Albert Hasper – CEO of PHIX Photonics Assembly; Inigo Artundo – CEO of VLC Photonics; Jean-Louis Gentner – CEO of Almae; Thomas Hessler – CEO of Ligentec; Ewit Roos – CEO of PhotonDelta

The plan calls for €4.25 billion in funding over eight years and a range of recommendations to enable the European integrated photonics industry to become a global leader and have the ability to supply EU customers autonomously.

The group states that the low level of EU manufacturing capacity and over-reliance on Asia threatens the EU’s economic security and resilience.

Currently, less than 6% of the manufacturing of indium phosphide and silicon nitride PICs is done in the EU and less than  4% of global assembly, testing and packaging capacity resides in Europe.

Furthermore, research by Dutch photonics ecosystem PhotonDelta highlights that competitor nations are making concerted efforts to acquire EU PIC technologies and assets along with seeking stakes in EU SMEs companies in the EU PIC supply chain.

The eight CEOs unveiled the plan at PIC Summit Europe in front of more than 500 members of the global photonics and semiconductor communities.

The proposal makes a number of recommendations including:

Provide over €2 billion in incentives for industrial scale InP and SiN PIC manufacturing capacity in Europe.

Provide EU PIC SMEs access to industrial PIC Test and Experimentation facilities (TEF’s) that partly mirror commercial lines, with the latest commercial wafer processing equipment and tools, at the relevant industry standard wafer sizes.

Establish an industrial PIC ‘manufacturing supply chain’ resilience fund of €200 million to support the investments needed to strengthen linkages and minimise vulnerabilities.

Provide a €360 million fund to stimulate application development through offering design tape-outs, leading to industrial photonic design IP creation and validation based on hardware testing m.

Promote and incentivise collaboration amongst vertical clusters and the European PIC ecosystem.