EU invests €6m to transform factory networks
A new European Horizon project supported by the Photonics Partnership that aims to power the digital backbone of modern industry is laying the foundations for ultra-connected smart factories.
With €6 million investment from the European Commission, and multiple research and industry partners from across Europe, the SPRINTER project will develop cutting-edge, free-space optical and mmWave technology.
The aim is to replace the current mixture of copper cables, unreliable Wi-Fi, and switching systems, with super-fast, laser-driven communications systems — all built for the chaos of the factory floor.
At the heart of the new initiative are optical transceivers supporting an aggregate data rate of 200 Gb/s. Project partners will develop InP-EML arrays, GaAs-VCSEL arrays, and InP-PD arrays, as the key optical components for these low-cost and energy-efficient transceivers.
The partners will also produce an ultra-fast tunable InP/Si3N4 external cavity laser, a LNOI-MZM and an InP-MZM as optical components for ultra-dynamic optical transceivers supporting data rates of 10 Gb/s
Another part of the project will be to build a hybrid photonic platform to allow switching from light to mmWave signals in order to offer more flexibility and backup. This is to ensure immunity against any interference such as dust, smoke, or a passing bird blocking the beams of light.
A Reconfigurable Optical Add-Drop Multiplexer (ROADM) optimised for space-division multiplexing will boost flexibility and efficiency.
The project will be led by the Institute of Communication and Computer Systems (ICCS) in Athens. Key contributors include Fraunhofer (Germany), IMEC (Belgium), LioniX International (Netherlands), and Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (Spain), alongside global tech firms like Ericsson (Italy) and Mellanox Technologies (Israel).
Agile SMEs such as PHIX, CUMUCORE, and FILL GmbH add specialised expertise in photonic packaging, 5G networking, and smart manufacturing. Swiss partner CSEM also supports the project, contributing expertise in microtechnology and system integration.
“Industry 5.0 demands faster, smarter, and more robust networks,” said Efstathios Andrianopoulos, a researcher on the ICCS team that leads SPRINTER. “Our goal is to make Europe the world leader in industrial photonics — providing the tools to support the next generation of automation, robotics and intelligent systems.”
“Factories are full of moving parts, dust, and interference — a nightmare for traditional Wi-Fi. That’s why we are developing hybrid 'free-space optical and mmWave' transceivers that combine laser and radio technologies to maintain wireless connections, even in the noisiest settings.
“We are building a unified network platform that supports time-sensitive networking systems where delays of even milliseconds can mean the difference between smooth automation and a factory shutdown,” said Andrianopoulos.
