Fraunhofer starts photonics incubator in Twente

At the Hannover Messe trade fair last week the Fraunhofer Project Center (FPC) announced the start of a photonics incubator. The Dutch department of the German research institute, located in Twente, feels it can particularly help companies with the assembly of their photonic systems. This part of the production chain is currently still done by hand, preventing scale-up to larger volumes. To address this, the FPC last year developed (link in Dutch) a micro-assembly system for photonic systems. By providing access to this machine, the incubator will support companies during their development process and initial low-volume production phase. Like the Center itself, the business incubator will be housed on the University of Twente campus, which is also home to photonics assembly foundry Phix (link in Dutch).