Fonontech lands €2.3M for impulse printing chip packages and flat screens

After a decade of exploring and developing the market, Fonontech is getting ready to scale up a printer capable of producing both advanced chip packaging and flat displays. The startup has landed 2.3 million euros in a seed investment round. This round was made possible through convertible loans of the TTT Smart Industries Fund, Shift Invest, the Brabant Development Agency (BOM), the Brabant Startup Fund (BSF) and investor Sake Bosch. Rabobank has also granted a loan. The goal is to gain a foothold in the microelectronics assembly market, an industry that analysts expect to double to 78 billion euros in the next five years.

Fonontech was founded in 2022 as a spinoff of TNO at Holst Centre in Eindhoven to bring impulse printing to the market. The startup has now built a demo machine that proves that the technology works. The system fills microspores on a silicon plate with conductive ink, after which a short but violent pulse of current is sent through the wires within this mold, causing an eruption of heat that fires the pattern onto a substrate. “It even works at a distance of half a meter, although you do sacrifice some precision,” says CEO Rob Hendriks, laughingly.