EU Industrial Leadership Gets Boost through Launch of Three Advanced Pilot Lines in Photonics

Three major pilot lines, which help SMEs take photonics technologies from lab into market, have been launched by the Photonics Public Private Partnership (PPP). The Pilot Lines mean that thousands of high tech SMEs in Europe – who often lack access to advanced, cost-intensive infrastructures and expertise needed to manufacture new and innovative products – will be able to take their good ideas, scale-them up and validate them with the first customers for commercial production.
 
The pilot lines will focus on health applications, flexible OLEDs and sensors for the detection of chemicals in gas and liquids. The European Commission has invested €35 million in these projects to boost Europe’s industrial competitiveness. This is part of the Commission’s €700 million investment in the Photonics Public Private Partnership over the seven years of Horizon 2020, the Framework Programme for Research and Innovation.
 
The three manufacturing Pilot Lines are PIX4LIFE, MIRPHAB and PI-SCALE.
 
PIX4Life is a pilot for a state-of-the-art photonics platform for health applications. Recently, a promising silicon nitride photonic integrated circuit technology was researched to make compact, low cost detection and imaging systems in the visible range and the TriPleXTM and BioPIX platforms were developed. PIX4Life will scale up these platforms in order to bring silicon nitride-based systems towards commercial production and industrial take up. This will open a multibillion market of products including biosensors, cytometers, DNA sequencers, gas sensors, microscopes, medical imagers and more. The project brings together 15 leading organizations and is coordinated by imec, Belgium. 
 
PI-SCALE is a pilot line providing open access services in order to accelerate the commercial adoption of flexible OLEDs. These large area, energy efficient light sources are ultra-thin, flexible, lightweight films which can be made or cut to any shape or size allowing new opportunities to create high value-added products in many different application areas, such as architectural lighting, automotive, aerospace, consumer electronics and the built environment. PI-SCALE will enable companies to quickly and cost effectively test and scale up their flexible OLED lighting concepts and turn them into market ready products. PI-SCALE brings together 14 expert partners and is coordinated by Holst Centre, the Netherlands.
 
MIRPHAB is a pilot line for prototyping and production of innovative sources and sensors in the Mid-IR range, for the detection of chemicals in gas and liquids. MIRPHAB platform is based on miniaturized laser systems and will allow the manufacturing of compact, low cost and low power consumption sensing devices which can be used for safety, security and environmental applications. The project brings together 18 leading organizations and is coordinated by CEA-Leti, France.