StarIC Featured by PhotonDelta
PhotonDelta published a featurette titled 'Canada's StarIC fills a void in the PhotonDelta ecosystem,' spotlighting StarIC's electronics-for-photonics capabilities and growing presence in the Dutch and European integrated photonics landscape.
Canadian IC design firm StarIC has reached across the Atlantic by opening an R&D office in Utrecht, the Netherlands, taking its expertise in electronics-for-photonics to the PhotonDelta ecosystem. The properties of light may render it superior to electrons in performing certain tasks, but photons could never do without the assistance of their charged cousins. Light-based chips need power, driver electronics, and an interface with the outside world.
Based in Toronto and founded in 2019, StarIC specializes in analog and mixed-signal electronic design. The design of components like drivers, transimpedance amplifiers, serializer/deserializer transceivers (SerDes), and control circuits purpose-built to operate alongside PICs has grown into one of the firm's key differentiators.
'There's real value in having electronics people who understand photonics. We have people on board who understand what our customers are trying to build, who know what questions to ask and who know the typical pitfalls. As far as I am aware, there are very few companies out there who can operate at this intersection of skill sets,' says CEO Imran Ahmed of StarIC.
StarIC can deliver custom designs built from scratch and tailored to customer needs, and has also started to develop building blocks that can be mixed and matched to create solutions. 'We'll still customise as much as needed, but at least we won't have to start entirely from scratch. Things are moving fast in the world of photonics, and we've found that many customers appreciate this approach,' Ahmed said.
'There are a lot of synergies,' Ahmed continued. 'We'll benefit from being a part of a world-leading ecosystem with a lot of potential customers and partners, not to mention the talent we can access here. Conversely, we'll be able to support many of the innovations that are born and nurtured here, helping to drive the technology and the ecosystem forward.'
The PhotonDelta ecosystem prides itself on covering the entire integrated photonics value chain — from design to testing and packaging — but expertise in electronics-for-photonics may have been a missing piece. Now, that gap has been filled.