SMART Photonics
SMART Photonics is an independent pure-play Indium Phosphide (InP) foundry that manufactures photonic integrated circuits (PICs) for customers who design chips that use light instead of electrons for faster, more energy-efficient data transmission. The company offers an open foundry model with a Process Design Kit containing over 50 validated building blocks, supporting customers from prototyping to high-volume production on 4-inch wafers, with 6-inch capacity expected by 2028.
- Semiconductor
Funding
Raised to date
€135MRaised to date based on public sources. This may differ from the amount the company actually raised and is based only on what is publicly available on the internet.
Est. $147.2Macross 2 rounds
AB+8€100M · Undisclosed
Announced Jul 2023
Disclosed cumulative: $147.2M
Founders
Product
Problem
Developing advanced photonic integrated circuits (PICs) for telecommunications, sensing, and medical applications is hindered by the complexity and cost of custom fabrication. Accessing foundry processes and designing novel PICs requires specialized tools and significant upfront investment, limiting innovation for many organizations. The growing demand for data transmission is also driving energy consumption in data centers to unsustainable levels, requiring more efficient alternatives to electron-based communication.
Solution
SMART Photonics provides a pure-play InP foundry service that enables the development and fabrication of custom photonic integrated circuits. The company operates an open foundry model, allowing customers to leverage advanced manufacturing infrastructure while retaining full ownership of their intellectual property. Their Process Design Kits (PDKs) integrate libraries of over 50 validated photonic building blocks, streamlining the design process for engineers. SMART Photonics supports customers from proof of concept through alpha production to high-volume manufacturing on the same industrial platform, reducing development costs and accelerating time to market. The company's InP platform enables full integration of active and passive components on a single chip, supporting applications in data centers, telecommunications, sensing, and healthcare.
Target Audience
Primary customers are companies and research institutions in data centers, telecommunications, sensing (e.g., LiDAR), healthcare, and quantum technologies that require custom-designed photonic integrated circuits and seek scalable manufacturing without building their own fabrication infrastructure.
Features
- Independent pure-play InP foundry with an open model that preserves customer IP ownership
- Process Design Kit (PDK) with 50+ validated building blocks, implemented in Synopsys, VPIphotonics, Luceda, Lumerical, Nazca, and PhotonDesign software
- Full integration of active and passive photonic components on a single chip
- Manufacturing on 4-inch InP wafers with a production capacity of 5,000 wafers per year
- 6-inch InP pilot line expected by end of 2027, with full production capacity of over 12,000 wafers per year expected by 2028
- High-speed platform demonstrated up to 35 GHz with semi-insulating substrate option
- ISO 9001-certified manufacturing with support from prototyping to high-volume production
- Epitaxial growth and re-growth services, including custom layer stack development for quantum wells and photodiodes