Ontario is now competing globally in terms of opto-electronic components due to a unique new Ottawa facility: the Canadian Photonics Fabrication Centre.
“There’s nothing like it in North America,” says Carleton University’s Dr. Garry Tarr, a leading photonics researcher who has spearheaded Carleton’s involvement in the Centre. “The closest similar facility is in Scotland.”
The fabrication centre, located at the National Research Council, enables companies and researchers to prototype and test components related to emerging photonics technologies that exploit light or photon dynamics. These technologies have application in sectors as diverse as communications, health, energy, environment and security.
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Absolutely Fab A new fabrication facility in Ottawa is positioning Ontario on the cutting edge of photonics. |
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“De-risking” investment and technology. The Canadian Photonics Fabrication Centre is a unique way to connect strengths in Canada’s high tech sector. “You can’t make a private business case for a photonics fabrication facility in Canada,” says the Centre’s Director, Dr. Sylvan Charbonneau, explaining the facility’s need for public funding. Instead, the Centre serves as a resource for business. “One of our mandates is to ‘de-risk’ investment and technology.” In other words, the Centre enables small but innovative Canadian companies to avoid the expense and risk of funding their own fabrication plants, or relying on the facilities of large American electronics firms where they may lose their intellectual property. “We’re enabling a new wave of businesses.” |
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The facility, a joint federal and provincial collaboration—and built with the help of a significant investment from the Ontario Innovation Trust—fills a major void in Canada’s high-tech landscape. “The CPFC shows what can happen when organizations join forces for a common good,” says Dr. Sylvain Charbonneau, Manager of the CPFC and Director at the NRC-Institute for Microstructural Sciences. “Our alliance will help Canadian researchers and firms access specialized facilities and equipment and ultimately commercialize leading edge technologies.”
With the opening of the Centre, Canadian companies can now do their prototyping work in Canada, instead of going abroad. And because of the unique nature of the facility, several U.S. and European companies have also chosen to do business with the CPFC. For Ontario, the Centre offers another key benefit. It’s keeping highly-trained photonics personnel in the province—and providing a context for the world-class training of a new generation of photonics specialists.
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