Headlines
Interview
“I’ll be honest: We’re in the death zone”
3D chip systems create formidable opportunities for Europe and the Netherlands, believes Hamed Sadeghian, CEO of Nearfield Instruments. He sees new business models emerging in the production of silicon systems and equipment. Seizing those opportunities will require courage, however, as well as a willingness to collaborate.
Opinion
Europe can lead in how chips become systems
Hamed Sadeghian proposes the creation by leading Dutch high-tech players of an industrial venture for semiconductor systems scaling.
Editorial
Dutch semicon ecosystem needs focus, not fragmentation
It’s time to throw the ballast overboard and set a clear course in the Netherlands.
Background
From research tool to software modernization service
What started as TNO-ESI research into analyzing and transforming sprawling software codebases has grown into a commercial software modernization offering from Capgemini. Generative AI is now opening up new opportunities.
Background
Integrated photonics is moving into mainstream supply chains, creating opportunities for Dutch high-tech
The growing maturity of integrated photonics creates opportunities for the wider Dutch high-tech industry. Not only in manufacturing capabilities like specialized equipment, manufacturing, packaging and testing, but also in system integration and the next generation of products in AI infrastructure, autonomous machines and smaller optical instruments for healthcare, agrifood and defense.
Background
Lace takes lithography beyond light
The Norwegian-Dutch startup Lace Lithography is betting that neutral helium atoms will take center stage in the next major leap in semiconductor patterning.
Background
Quantamap hunts the defects holding back quantum computing
Most quantum computing chips don’t work as well as they should, but nobody understands why. Leiden-based startup Quantamap is developing tools to hunt down critical defects, paving the way toward scalable chip-based quantum computing.
Top job
Events
Courses
Background
Simulating the path to the next generation of smart glasses
Smart glasses may need a new kind of display before they can become an everyday device. Swave Photonics is working on that challenge with holographic display technology on chip. Using Comsol simulation software, the Imec spinoff models how heat, materials and optical behavior interact before committing to expensive chip prototypes.
Interview
Advantest’s breeding ground for new test technology is in Zwolle
Salland Engineering, part of Japan’s Advantest since 2024, is quadrupling its test capacity. CEO Paul van Ulsen discusses the rapid changes sweeping through semiconductor testing. “We now operate as Advantest’s engineering and photonics test house.”
News
Trumpf seeks cost reductions for EUV power supplies in Poland, not Asia
Trumpf is under strong pressure from ASML to reduce costs. The German family-owned company is now transferring series production of power supplies from Freiburg to Warsaw, Poland. EUV drive lasers will also benefit from these savings. Trumpf considers production in Asia too risky.
Interview
“Materials will play a huge role in scaling going forward”
As dimensional scaling is slowing down, the industry is entering the materials age, says Vamsi Paruchuri, ASM’s Corporate VP of Technology, Innovation and Market Research.
Background
High Tech Almere aims to give Dutch chip ecosystem room to grow
With ASM as an anchor and a planned research institute focused on advanced materials, Almere wants to build a new high-tech campus from scratch, creating room for the Dutch semiconductor industry to keep growing.
Background
Orange Quantum Systems bets on becoming the ASML of quantum testing
Quantum computing has no shortage of ambitious hardware developers racing to build ever larger processors. Delft-based Orange Quantum Systems wants to test them all.
Background
The shared challenge of particle accelerators and chip machines
Control systems for deep-tech tools share several common denominators, whether in a particle accelerator or a proton therapy linac: real-time operation, deterministic behavior and zero room for failure. Cosylab built this expertise over 25+ years. Now, it’s applying it in the semiconductor industry.