Canada Focuses Funding on Photonics and Quantum - EE Times

Accelerated, Canada’s national semiconductor symposium, provided a stage to showcase some of the first recipients of funding from FABrIC, a five-year CDN $223 (U.S. $163 million) initiative to grow the semiconductor industry in Canada.Managed by CMC Microsystems, which also hosted the conference, the funding program put out a call for applications in September 2024. The first round of FABrIC Challenge Projects was announced in June 2025, allocating a total of CDN $35.6 million (U.S. $26 million) in total investment, including CDN $13.4 million (U.S. $9.8 million) in funding provided by Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada.This round and each subsequent round of FABrIC Challenges will have specific areas of focus. The first call for applications had two streams.The first stream requested projects that sought to develop and commercialize new advanced sensors and other semiconductor products for strategic end sectors. The second stream requested fabrication processes for developing semiconductor manufacturing capabilities in strategic core technologies, including photonics, MEMS, quantum technologies like computing, and compound semiconductors to make them widely accessible across Canada. Photonics was well represented at the Accelerated project presentation session, which showcased several winners out of 20.Among them was Ranovus Inc., a high profile photonics player founded in Ottawa, that also has offices worldwide. Mike Sekerka, the company’s VP and general manager of the company’s defense and government business unit, said Ranovus has a strong R&D focus on developing multi-wavelength laser test chips for large-scale applications, including programs for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.He said FABrIC funding is helping Ranovus develop a showcase of Canadian technology to meet the global requirements for co-packaged optics in high demand for interconnect clusters of GPUs and memory. “There’s this gap between where the interconnect is and where compute is,” Sekerka said. “That really creates a problem for the system designer because you can’t exploit the advantages of the advances in compute.”The transition from copper to optical typically involves moving to pluggable modules, but Sekerka said this form factor consumes a lot of power in modern AI clusters, which is why Ranovus has developed its own chip that can go into the module.Like Ranovus, Dream Photonics is addressing opportunities created by the rapid growth of AI data centers. Company co-founder Sudip Shekhar said the bulk of the cost of a transceiver is the packaging, testing and assembly, not the photonic IC (PIC) itself. “This is a huge problem.”He said the current generation of silicon photonics is in danger of running out of steam. “Building the next generation of transceivers is like building a rocket ship.”Dream Photonics has been in business for five years and collaborating with 30 customers while taking inspiration from LEGO—the company’s hybrid integration aims to build transceivers with the best pieces available, including the lasers, modulators and detectors, Shekhar said.The company’s 3D printed additive manufacturing lens solution can work with any foundry in the world. “You can put together different technologies and glue them together,” he said.FABrIC funding is helping Dream Photonics with its go-to-market strategy with various component manufacturers to build the next generation of transceivers, Shekhar said.AI is not the only driver of Canadian photonics technology development—it is also fueled by the need for quantum computing interconnects.Montreal-based Aeponyx Enterprises was recently acquired by a neutral‑atom quantum computing company Pascal, leading the company to focus on developing systems based on laser technology and advancing their quantum computing capabilities by integrating its PICs directly into neutral‑atom processors, where arrays of laser beams trap, arrange and entangle atoms as qubits.“The goal of the project is scale up the quantum computer,” Philippe Babin, Aeponyx’s general manager, said.FABrIC funding will help Aeponyx develop a low-loss Si Nitride PIC platform to realize compact optical filters for refining the linewidth of semiconductor laser diodes operating at visible or NIR wavelengths for quantum computing applications.Babin said Aeponyx will leverage CMC’s shared fabrication and packaging infrastructure to continue developing its PIC technology.Pascal has strongly committed to keeping a presence in Montreal to further develop Aeponyx’s technology as it scales up its technology and delivers four quantum computers in Europe and Saudi Arabia, he said. “The FABrIC project is basically meant to help us to develop the technology here in Canada.”The second FABrIC funding challenge closed at the end of October and focused on attracting applications developing IoT products, including edge AI and ocean/marine IoT. Gary Hilson is a freelance writer and editor who has written thousands of words for print and pixel publications across North America. His areas of interest include software, enterprise and networking technology, research and education, sustainable transportation, and community news. His articles have been published by Network Computing, InformationWeek, Computing Canada, Computer Dealer News, Toronto Business Times, Strategy Magazine, and the Ottawa Citizen. You must Register or Login to post a comment.This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.