The Institut de Ciències Fotòniques (ICFO) has been selected to lead a European project for the creation of photonic chips, a strategic commitment by the European Union to reinforce the technological sovereignty and industrial competitiveness of the continent.
Unlike conventional electronic chips, which run on electrons, photonic chips run on photons. They have the advantages of transmitting data faster, further miniaturizing integrated circuits and reducing the heating of their components, and therefore also the need for cooling and the energy consumption of computers and data centers. They are expected to revolutionize data transmission and sensor technologies, and have important applications in medical diagnosis, autonomous cars, smartphones or the aerospace industry, among other fields.
For these applications to be developed, the gap between photonics research – already advanced in Europe – and industrial production – still incipient – must first be closed. With the aim of accelerating the transition from science to industry, in July the EU published the call for the Pilot Line of Advanced Photonic Integrated Circuits, endowed with 380 million euros. Of this amount, half will be contributed by the European Commission and the other half by the participating states.
By running on photons instead of electrons, the new chips will be faster and more efficient
The pilot line must “facilitate the development of reliable, scalable and cost-effective photonic integrated circuit solutions,” the EU has reported. Among the candidates to develop photonic chip technology, it has chosen an international consortium led by the ICFO, which includes both research centers and companies.
It has not been made public how much of the project budget will be invested in Spain, although it is estimated that it may be around 150 million euros. In the Netherlands, which will also play an important role, 133 million will be invested, mainly in two chip production facilities, as reported by NPR.
On the Spanish side, the funds will be provided by the Ministry of Digital Transformation and Public Function, headed by Óscar López. The budget comes from Perte Chip, one of the projects for economic recovery that were activated after the covid pandemic using European Next Generation funds.
European Commissioner Thierry Breton, announcing in 2022 the plan to create a European chip industry
The photonic chip initiative is part of the so-called Chip Joint Undertaking, created with the aim of defending the technological sovereignty of the continent.
Europe competes with the United States and Asia in this emerging technology. In a recent milestone, researchers in Denmark transmitted, using a photonic chip, and over a 7.9 kilometer fiber optic cable, a volume of information equivalent to all global Internet traffic, illustrating the potential of the technology.
Within Europe, the ICFO, based in Castelldefels, is valued as one of the leading scientific institutions in photonics. The European Research Council, the most competitive institution on the continent for financing projects of excellence, has selected fifty ICFO projects in fifteen years worth around 100 million euros.
The EU needs to manufacture its own chips to stop technologically depending on Asia and the US.
The European photonic chip project will be led from the ICFO by Valerio Pruneri, an Icrea researcher specializing in optoelectronics. Pruneri, who has founded three companies based on the results of his research, shares with the European Chip Joint Venture the vision of building bridges between science and industry.
It is expected that the direction of the Pilot Line of Photonic Chips will help attract talent to Catalonia and favor business competitiveness. Along these lines, the Universitat Politècnica (UPC) announced on October 29 the creation of the Perte Chip Chair, of which the ICFO and the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC) are part, as well as thirteen technology and microelectronics companies.
In the presentation of the chair, the Secretary of State for Telecommunications, Antonio Herrando, defended “the Government’s commitment to the development of the semiconductor industry in Europe, with the collaboration of public universities and the companies that participate in the initiative ”.
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