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European manufacturing platform for Photonic Integrated Circuits (EuroPIC) - Time to change

Area of relevance: 
The applications space for Photonic integrated circuits is very broad: Telecommunications, data communications, medical imaging, sensors, metrology and consumer photonics to name but a few.
Duration: 
1 August 2009 - 31 July 2012
Affiliation: 
Programme Co-ordinators: TU Eindhoven and Willow Photonics. Two EuroPIC consortium members, Oclaro (UK) and FhG-HHI (Germany) plan to open up their Indium Phosphide fabs to the generic approach.
Funded by: 
European Commission, EU

Abstract:

The objective of EuroPIC (www.europic.org) is to effect a fundamental change in the way applications based on photonic integrated circuits (PICs) in Indium Phosphide are designed and manufactured. The key development is to facilitate access by small companies (SMEs) to development and manufacturing of photonic micro-systems in the form of advanced but very cost effective PICs. EuroPIC intends to bring forth a new methodology; addressing the whole production chain from idea via proof of concept, design and prototype to production and application. The consortium will carry out research which will lead an open-access industrial generic foundry production capability for Europe; a new business sector with the potential for very significant future growth. This will be done by developing a generic technology capable of realising complex PICs from a small set of basic building blocks. EuroPIC will demonstrate the potential of this approach by fabricating a number of Application Specific PICs (ASPICs) with a record combination of complexity and performance.The consortium is in an excellent position to carry out this ambitious task. It includes Europe's key players in the technology. Further, EuroPIC is building a strong User Group, many of them SMEs, with members from different application fields, providing Europe with a competitive advantage over the US and the Far East. EuroPIC builds on the FP6 European Network of Excellence, ePIXnet, (www.epixnet.org).