Silicon Eurocluster - Silicon Alps

Silicon Eurocluster

Helps to place Europe in a leading position in development and production of Micro- and Nanoelectronics!

The Silicon Eurocluster project aims to achieve greater European self-sufficiency, with increased competitiveness and resilience in the electronics value chain, with specific attention to SMEs.

The existing Silicon Europe strong alliance of leading micro- and nanoelectronics, enriched by competencies from Bulgaria, will synergize the updated European industrial strategy to boost its value chains to be greener, more digital, and more resilient against disruption. Silicon Eurocluster wants to place Europe in a leading position in the development and production of Micro- and Nanoelectronics (key enabling technologies) by harnessing the teamwork of existing high-potential clusters.

Who takes part in the project and what they are focusing on?

The three companies „CISC Semiconductor“, „ARTI – Autonomous Robot Technology GmbH“ and „Flasher GmbH“ have decided to take part in the Silicon Eurocluster Project. They explain what the reason was for participating, what project they focus on during the running funding programme and what challenges they had to face so far.

Why should a company participate in the Silicon Eurocluster project?

Ralph Weissnegger from CISC Semiconductor: We are taking part in the Silicon Eurocluster Project because it is an important catalyst for SMEs like us to develop. International cooperation projects like this give our products a decisive edge in emerging technology fields such as artificial intelligence and human-centricity. Participation allows us to work closely with customers and partners to collaborate on new challenges and stay at the forefront of technology.

Konstantin Mautner-Lassnig from ARTI – Robots: Thanks to the support we have received in the Silicon Eurocluster project, we have been able to take the step of transforming our various solutions into a new, innovative product idea. Thanks to the joint expertise of Pixelrunner and ARTI, we are confident that we can create an outstanding, high-quality solution for the target market.

The situation is similar to Alexander Rech from Flasher GmbH: It offers an ideal opportunity to develop, evaluate and further refine new technologies in cooperation with industry partners.

What are the projects they are focusing on within the Silicon Eurocluster?

CISC Semiconductor

🚀 „VerIoT“ (9-month project) for testing of RFID & NFC tags

☁ Local data analysis on the CISC testing devices saves time, energy and ressources

ARTI – Robots

🖨 „SIMPRINT“ outdoor-printer for landscapes, compact/easy and quick to use

🔗 Together with Pixelrunner

Flasher GmbH

🧠 Intelligent wearables (with sensors, high power LED, …)

🎧 Smart Beacon = compact plug & play communication units for safe or dangerous areas

What were the challenges so far and what went perfectly fine during the project?

CISC Semiconductor: Time is a crucial factor in the project, which is why we endeavour to keep latency times as low as possible. We use powerful EdgeAI hardware for data calculation in order to deliver transparent results based on AI and analyse them locally. Collaboration with industry partners has been particularly successful so far, contributing significantly to effectively tackling challenges in the project and developing a deeper understanding of the requirements.

ARTI – Robots: At the beginning of the project, it was also important to focus on low-cost components in the implementation. One of the first challenges was to find the right components and sensors for the product from the large selection of options. The simplest possible operation usually means sophisticated methods in the background in order to realise the complex process. We are proud of this result, as it makes the application accessible to non-experts outside the industry.

Flasher GmbH: The challenge was to find the optimum combination of detection accuracy, communication range, battery life and response times. Our evaluations showed promising practical results in the construction site area: accuracy in the range of a few decimetres, response times of less than one second and a battery life of several months with our basic settings. All parameters can be further optimised to meet different requirements.

What is the current status and what can you say overall about the Silicon Eurocluster?

CISC Semiconductor: The current summary of the project is extremely positive. Thanks to participation in the project, collaborations have been established that would not have been possible without this support.

ARTI – Robots: We have been working with Pixelrunner in the field of landscape printing for several years now. Over this period, we have developed joint, industry-specific expertise. With SIMPRINT, we show how innovative concepts can be effectively transformed into a product in the shortest possible time.

Flasher GmbH: We are very satisfied with the course of the project and its results and will build on this to push ahead with further collaborations in the B2B sector.

Open Call

The project aims to achieve greater European self-sufficiency with increased competitiveness and resilience in the electronics value chain paying attention to SMEs. In this context, we launch our Open call for demonstration projects where we expect to fund 25 market-oriented projects involving consortia with at least 2 SMEs. Funded projects will receive up to 80.000€ and the total budget of the open call is 1.010.000 €.

The projects to be funded under this call are technology solutions including a prototype (demonstrator) of a microelectronics system and which may include other technologies such as radio communications, cybersecurity, energy harvesting, AI, sensors, or photonics. Eligible activities may include:

Investigation of technical and design requirements.
Development of prototypes or demonstration versions of products or services. This may also include pilot work, testing, and validation.

Planning and carrying out studies/testing to verify an innovation.
Investigation of market conditions, such as identifying customers, customer needs, potential partners, and competitors

The challenges and proposed solutions should describe how to improve resource efficiency, support green entrepreneurship, and facilitate market access for SMEs offering green products and services.

The call will be open from 28/03/2023 until 31/05/2023 at 17.00 CET. Two informative webinars with a Q&A session will be organized on the 18th of April and the 03rd of May.

More information about the Open Call can be found here

Learn more

Project details

Goals

Project description

The Silicon Eurocluster project aims to achieve greater European self-sufficiency, with increased competitiveness and resilience in the electronics value chain, with specific attention to SMEs. The semiconductor industry, a foundation of all electronics, impacts the entire European Value Chain. Its independence will build a strong basis for a greener and more digital economy. Several regions cluster the technological expertise and resources of Europe’s leading SMEs, industries, and research organizations in innovative electronics. A strong alliance of leading micro- and nanoelectronics regions already exists – The Silicon Europe Alliance. Enriched by competencies from Bulgaria, the alliance aims to synergize the updated European industrial strategy: to boost its value chains to be greener, more digital, and resilient against disruption. Silicon Eurocluster will initiate the following actions:

Develop and strengthen value chain interlinkages in the EU single market to enhance the resilience of the EU industrial ecosystem
Increase strategic autonomy in the most critical supplies and technologies of these ecosystems by building capacities
Adopt processes and technology to support the transformation to a greener and more digital economy
Attract talent to stimulate and scale up the workforce
Go international, reconnect, and boost access to global supply and value chains.

Silicon Eurocluster wants to place Europe in a leading position in the development and production of Micro- and Nanoelectronics (key enabling technologies) by harnessing the teamwork of existing high-potential clusters in Spain, Portugal, France, Italy, Germany, Austria, Bulgaria, Sweden, and the Netherlands. Extending the collaboration among the clusters to a registered European cluster association will have a major impact on the global competitiveness of Europe’s electronics systems. The project ambitions provide direct support to at least 50 SMEs via financial support (25 green vouchers and 25 demo projects) & support them in internationalization, innovation, networking, and training towards digitized and green.

In the project, we envisage having around 300 organizations participate in the Silicon Eurocluster activities concluding with 20 business partnerships signed by the companies supported, at least 50 SMEs will receive funding via the FSTP scheme (25 green vouchers and 25 demo projects) to support them in internationalization, innovation, networking and training towards digitized and green. Additionally, 20 cluster employees will be trained, and 15 SMEs will benefit from Internationalisation support. The project will run until February 2025 and has a budget of more than 1.5 million euros with funding of about 1.4 million coming from the European Union. 1.05 million will be addressed to financially support European Small and Medium Enterprises.

Considering the global competition, especially in times of crises like the current corona crisis, and considering the great assets that the European electronics industry already possesses, there is an excellent chance to succeed in maintaining, structuring, and strengthening this very important electronics value chain in Europe. The rationale of our project proposals is as follows:

semiconductors and all related electronics value chains are crucial for myriad industries (not only automotive). Design and production are necessary to have technology sovereignty
European cooperation is key to long-term success

Your contact person

DI (FH) Gernot Eder

Site Manager Graz & Business Development

After my studies as a Health Care Engineer – focusing on medical technologies and health informatics – at the University of Applied Sciences Graz, I made my first professional experiences at GS1 in Vienna. In the field of logistics, I have been involved in numerous projects with hospitals, medical technology and pharma companies. After my return to Graz, I was able to shape the field of medical technologies at the Human.technology Cluster as a business developer, pushing important topics such as sensor technologies, microelectronics or production technologies in the life science context on the national and international levels. With the foundation of nubid, I have been able to support numerous companies and start-ups in the field of medical technologies and digitization in expanding their business.

As Business Development and Innovation Manager I can perfectly use my experience and network from science and business to generate added value for our partners at the SILICON ALPS Cluster. Especially in the context of sensor technologies and microelectronics, I will push the topics of start-up ecosystem and project development as well as internationalization.

“one plus one is more than two”

gernot.eder@silicon-alps.at

+43 664 88 22 62 56