UK PHOTONICS NEWS
FOCUS LATEST NEWS
Optoelectronics Research Centre awarded £11m funding for silicon photonics commercialisation
T
he Optoelectronics Research Centre (ORC) at the University of
Southampton has been chosen as one of two new Innovation and Knowledge Centres (IKC) to help bring new semiconductor chip technologies to market. Part of a £26.8m government
package to boost the UK’s research and production of microchips, the centre at the University of Southampton, called Cornerstone, will receive £11m to bring together industry and research expertise and improve the development and commercialisation of silicon photonics technologies. Professor Graham Reed,
Director of the ORC, said: “The Cornerstone centre will unite leading UK entrepreneurs and researchers, together with a network of support to improve the commercialisation of semiconductors and deliver a step-change in the silicon photonics industry.” In a post on his LinkedIn
page, Callum Littlejohns, Professorial Fellow (Enterprise) at University of Southampton
Saqib Bhatti, the UK’s Minister for Tech and the Digital Economy, leſt, and Professor Graham Reed, Director of the Optoelectronics Research Centre at the University of Southampton
(Cornerstone) and a 2023 Photonics100 honouree, said: “Our vision is to take silicon photonics from research labs to everyday life. We will aim to achieve this by developing a suite of training and networking opportunities aimed at helping
researchers generate social and economic impact from their research, supported by the fantastic team at Future Worlds. This will be underpinned by our record-breaking foundry, which will continue to push the boundaries of what is possible
with regards to speed of delivery, and quality of both our products and end-user support.” Funding for the centres came
from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) and Innovate UK, both part of UKRI.
Quantum photonic projects to benefit from £45m UK fund T
he UK government is planning to invest £45m in the region’s quantum
sector, with photonics-based projects set to benefit. The move forms part of the
UK’s aim to transform into a quantum-enabled economy by 2033 to overhaul healthcare, energy, transport and more. Of
4 Electro Optics March 2024
the seven funded companies, a flexible photonic quantum computing testbed for machine learning is set to be developed by Orca Computing, and an advanced research testbed manipulating photonic states will be created by Aegiq. Of the total investment, £30 million will go towards
developing prototype quantum computers, providing scientists and engineers with a controlled environment for experimentation, while £15 million will be put into a Quantum Catalyst Fund, aiming to accelerate the adoption of quantum solutions by the public sector. Under
the government’s plans, the UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) Technology Missions Fund and the National Quantum Computing Centre (NQCC) will invest £30 million through a competition to deliver quantum computing testbeds, based on diverse hardware architectures, by March 2025.
@electrooptics |
www.electrooptics.com
University of Southampton
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44
