The Netherlands has taken a defining step in the global photonics race. Construction has begun on a full industrial production line for Indium Phosphide (InP) photonic chips (PICs) on the High Tech Campus in Eindhoven. For the first time in Europe, the fab will be openly accessible to companies ready to fabricate PICs at scale, and TNO at Holst Centre will manage and operate the facility. 

The fabrication facility is the Dutch contribution to PIXEurope, a pan-European initiative funded by the EU Chips Act through the Chips Joint Undertaking. Across 11 European counties, 20 partnering organisations are developing different parts of the PIC supply chain. The Eindhoven pilot line is the piece closest to the market: a 6-inch wafer-scale InP fabrication facility, built to industrial standards, designed to move validated designs into volume production. Output targets are around 10,000 wafers per year (approximately 10 million PICs), with the capacity to double if demand requires it. 

This scale is not only desired, it is also required. PICs are becoming critical infrastructure for AI data centres, 6G networks, medical diagnostics and more. They enable high-speed, low-energy parallel data transfer that electronics alone cannot deliver. ‘When we started a year ago, people were asking how we would fill the capacity,’ says Boudewijn Docter, Engineering Director of the pilot line. ‘With the surge in AI and data centres, the question now is whether it will be enough.’ 

In addition to the scale, the access model for the facility is a key differentiator. Companies with a validated InP chip design can fabricate at the facility through a shared foundry model. Photonic Design Kits (PDKs), standardised building-block libraries, will keep process flows consistent across users and drive down cost.  

Through the Multi-Project Wafer (MPW) model, companies submit designs built to the PDK specifications and share wafer runs with other users. They receive fabricated chips without bearing the full cost of a dedicated production run. The facility operates with manufacturing discipline: baseline runs, statistical process control and rigorous repeatability standards. This ensures that every user benefits from a stable, predictable process. ‘Our focus is not on new functionality,’ says Docter. ‘It is on scaling up what already works: automation, repeatability and feeding performance data back into the design cycle so that every iteration gets faster and more accurate.’

Today, cycle times for a photonic chip can run six to twelve months. Processes are unstable, design accuracy is limited and packaging must be custom-engineered for each new application. The Eindhoven line is built to change that. ‘Once you can produce these chips reliably and at scale, the cost drops. And when the cost drops, new applications become viable,’ says Docter. ‘That is how photonics will follow the same path electronics took in the sixties and seventies. It starts in data centres, and it ends up everywhere.’

Lab to fab to leadership 

PIXEurope’s network of leading organisations ensures that companies not yet at the validated design stage are supported, too. The broader, Europe-wide PIXEurope ecosystem spans design, testing, hybrid integration and materials. In this way, PIXEurope aims to realise the EU Chips Act’s objectives of increased sovereignty and optimised chip manufacturing capabilities within Europe. 
 
For TNO at Holst Centre, the connection to this initiative is a natural one. Holst Centre was built on the principle of translating research into scalable, market-ready technology through open collaboration with industry. That same heritage, from display technology through flexible electronics and batteries, now extends to InP photonics. ‘Holst Centre has always worked at the intersection of research and industry,’ says Docter. ‘The indium phosphide work is relatively new for us, but the approach is not. We know how to take a process technology and make it reliable, repeatable and ready for the market.’ 

 
The facility is expected to be operational in 2028. Within five years, it will be commercialised or spun out as an independent production entity: a European photonics manufacturing capability built to last well beyond the programme that created it.