In 1988, Professor Bram Nauta made a groundbreaking discovery that continues to affect the lives of millions of people today: The Nauta circuit, found in all different kinds of electronic devices. “I hope with my personal story to encourage the younger generation to enter the world of engineering,” he said. The chip expert looks ahead to his talk at the Dutch Innovation Days 2023.
Without chips, the world is standing still. Our phones depend on them, as do cooling systems in stores, the internet and traffic lights. Nauta has been dealing with chips his entire professional career. His invention served as Nauta’s kickstart: an electronic circuit that was faster than competitors’ solutions at the time. The circuit has been widely used in the telecom industry.
That was then. And even today Nauta is not tired of the branch. Today he is a professor of Integrated Circuit Design at the University of Twente.
Encouraging the younger generation
During the Dutch Innovation Days, he shares his personal story with the audience. “I talk about how my circuit has changed electronics, specifically about how the invention has made electronic devices faster and more energy efficient.” Nauta wants to give an important message with his story. “We are facing a global chip shortage. I want to encourage the younger generation to study engineering and make beautiful new things.”
Outsmarting competitors
Nauta himself has never regretted it for a second. “You can express your creativity in the profession. You can compare making a chip to building a city. How do you regulate traffic without it getting stuck at intersections or traffic lights? It is a real challenge to outsmart your competitors, but with the same resources. We are very good at that here in the Netherlands. Hopefully, we will remain a leading country. If enough young people join the sector then I am confident about it.”
Independent Europe
Dutch chiptech will play an important key role on the world stage in the coming years. After all, Europe wants to be more independent. Countries like Taiwan and Korea dominate the market, but if it is up to the European Union, this will change in the short term, by means of the European Chips Act. The goal: double the share of chip production by 2030. Indeed, “Because the market will also double in that period, we even need to make four times as many chips. And there’s a need for next-generation chips. Think of photonic and microfluidic chips, and heterogeneous chips combining different technologies,” Nauta explains.
Twente: a chiptech incubator
Twente, in particular, is a true chiptech incubator that Nauta expects a lot from in the coming years. Chiptech Twente, founded by Nauta himself and others, is a community of companies and research groups in Twente focused on the integration of heterogeneous systems and chips. “And dozens of chip companies continuously seek cooperation to achieve new innovations,” Nauta said.
Twente companies such as LioniX International and PhiX are known for their development of photonic chips. These use light instead of electrons to perform their functions. Companies focused on microfluidic chips, such as Micronit, Medspray and Uneedle, have also established themselves in the region. And within the University of Twente (UT), there is a growing department around labs-on-a-chip: small devices that integrate various laboratory functions on a single chip.
“These techniques must be combined with electronic chips in order to apply them. In the future, Chiptech Twente will build new bridges between all these promising technologies. In this way, we want to promote our strong ecosystem around the world”, Nauta concludes.
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