Optic chips avoid traffic jams on the Internet. These fast and tiny switches make communication by light more feasible. Former TU Delft researchers are now commercialising their chips, developed at TU Delft.
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“It’s the integration of many components on our optic chip that makes it a success story,” says Dr. Chrétien Herben, Chief Technology Officer, at ThreeFive Photonics, who in 2000 received his Phd in the design of basic elements of an optic chip. “Most other groups working on chips are specialized on one component. In contrast, we concentrate on putting the different components on a chip at once and study the chips total performance.”
The young company, ThreeFive Photonics, was started by a manager and four PhDs from the Photonic Integrated Circuits research group attached to Dimes. Herben: %Each PhD was specialized in a different component of the chip and we worked closely together to integrate all those components on one optic chip and to miniaturize those chips.”
The enterprise focuses on chips that make up today%s telecommunication network subsystems. “Data flows in the form of light, pulsing through glass fibre cables,” Herben explains. “This information flow is fast when going over the ocean but once it reaches land, the information flow must be switched to the right country and, moreover, the right city. On these intersections, switching needs time. The chips or switches we develop are faster and thus prevent this delay.”
Argo
Atlas Venture and Gilde IT Fund, two well-known venture capital companies in communication technology, invested 7 million euro in the Dutch company. The latter provided the seed capital to launch ThreeFive Photonics early in 2001. The money will be used to build a clean room, in which the researchers want to complete the development of their first chip, codenamed Argo, and prepare it for production.
“We currently use Dimes’facilities, but want something of our own. Although we have the money, it’s not easy to find a proper building. We must adhere to environmental laws, the building must be air-conditioned, tremor-free and so on.”
In Dimes’ labs the company works on the reproducibility and the reliability of the optical chips components. When this is optimised, the chip is one small step closer to mass production. “We still don’t know if we’re going to build our own manufacturing plant or outsource production,” says Wouter Deelman, ThreeFive Photonics’ Chief Executive Officer.
A stumbling block for mass producing a chip is the reproductive process. “It’s very hard to reproduce a chip over and over again with the same performance,” says Herben. ” The contrast between university and a company is remarkable. At university you focus on proving a new concept and publishing the limits of the technology. You produce several devices and write your publication on the best performing chip. The publication is all that matters. Now we are a company, we settle for a chip with less than the best possible performances but make sure that they all work. We must think about the yield.”
Troublesome in chip production is the wafer’s uniformity. “The wafer is the foundation on which chips are built,” Herben explains, adding that wafers consist of several layers Indium Phosphide and Indium Gallium Arsenide Phosphide. “Technically it’s very difficult to produceall those layers exactly to the desired thickness and composition.”
The researchers developed their technologies at TU Delft and published their findings, which makes it public knowledge and means they don’t have to pay TU Delft. “We didn’t apply for patents on the chips we developed during our PhDs. Instead, everything was published. We now patent any new technology we develop,” Herben says. “Although everything’s public knowledge, we’re not afraid that someone will use our knowledge, because knowing how to make a chip in theory doesn’t mean that you’re able to make a chip in practice.”
Today, Internet reaches your home through copper threads. But soon, optic chips will allow every home to have its own glass fibre cable. “For speeding up the Internet, our chips will no longer be the most costly part of the infrastructure. The most expensive part will be digging up the streets to lay the glass fibre cables.”
Optic chips avoid traffic jams on the Internet. These fast and tiny switches make communication by light more feasible. Former TU Delft researchers are now commercialising their chips, developed at TU Delft.
“It’s the integration of many components on our optic chip that makes it a success story,” says Dr. Chrétien Herben, Chief Technology Officer, at ThreeFive Photonics, who in 2000 received his Phd in the design of basic elements of an optic chip. “Most other groups working on chips are specialized on one component. In contrast, we concentrate on putting the different components on a chip at once and study the chips total performance.”
The young company, ThreeFive Photonics, was started by a manager and four PhDs from the Photonic Integrated Circuits research group attached to Dimes. Herben: %Each PhD was specialized in a different component of the chip and we worked closely together to integrate all those components on one optic chip and to miniaturize those chips.”
The enterprise focuses on chips that make up today%s telecommunication network subsystems. “Data flows in the form of light, pulsing through glass fibre cables,” Herben explains. “This information flow is fast when going over the ocean but once it reaches land, the information flow must be switched to the right country and, moreover, the right city. On these intersections, switching needs time. The chips or switches we develop are faster and thus prevent this delay.”
Argo
Atlas Venture and Gilde IT Fund, two well-known venture capital companies in communication technology, invested 7 million euro in the Dutch company. The latter provided the seed capital to launch ThreeFive Photonics early in 2001. The money will be used to build a clean room, in which the researchers want to complete the development of their first chip, codenamed Argo, and prepare it for production.
“We currently use Dimes’facilities, but want something of our own. Although we have the money, it’s not easy to find a proper building. We must adhere to environmental laws, the building must be air-conditioned, tremor-free and so on.”
In Dimes’ labs the company works on the reproducibility and the reliability of the optical chips components. When this is optimised, the chip is one small step closer to mass production. “We still don’t know if we’re going to build our own manufacturing plant or outsource production,” says Wouter Deelman, ThreeFive Photonics’ Chief Executive Officer.
A stumbling block for mass producing a chip is the reproductive process. “It’s very hard to reproduce a chip over and over again with the same performance,” says Herben. ” The contrast between university and a company is remarkable. At university you focus on proving a new concept and publishing the limits of the technology. You produce several devices and write your publication on the best performing chip. The publication is all that matters. Now we are a company, we settle for a chip with less than the best possible performances but make sure that they all work. We must think about the yield.”
Troublesome in chip production is the wafer’s uniformity. “The wafer is the foundation on which chips are built,” Herben explains, adding that wafers consist of several layers Indium Phosphide and Indium Gallium Arsenide Phosphide. “Technically it’s very difficult to produceall those layers exactly to the desired thickness and composition.”
The researchers developed their technologies at TU Delft and published their findings, which makes it public knowledge and means they don’t have to pay TU Delft. “We didn’t apply for patents on the chips we developed during our PhDs. Instead, everything was published. We now patent any new technology we develop,” Herben says. “Although everything’s public knowledge, we’re not afraid that someone will use our knowledge, because knowing how to make a chip in theory doesn’t mean that you’re able to make a chip in practice.”
Today, Internet reaches your home through copper threads. But soon, optic chips will allow every home to have its own glass fibre cable. “For speeding up the Internet, our chips will no longer be the most costly part of the infrastructure. The most expensive part will be digging up the streets to lay the glass fibre cables.”
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