For the first time, the photonics industry was included in the five major directions of the country's "15th Five-Year Plan" industrial basic capabilities.

Recently, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the National Development and Reform Commission jointly issued the "15th Five-Year Plan for the Development of Electronic Information Manufacturing Industry". For the first time, the photonics industry has been included as an independent direction in the planning of "Building Basic Industrial Capabilities", and together with integrated circuits, electronic components and electronic materials, smart sensors, electronic special equipment and measuring instruments, it constitutes the five basic directions and has become one of the five basic directions that consolidate the base of my country's electronic information industry.

"Plan" proposed "Consolidate the foundation for the development of the photonics industry", promote technological breakthroughs in the core links of the photonics industry, support the R&D and iteration of simulation design software such as photonic design automation and optoelectronic collaborative design automation, build common process platforms such as micro-nano processing and manufacturing, and optoelectronic fusion integration, lay out photonic functional materials and process material R&D innovations, strengthen the supply of light generation, light processing, light sensing, integrated optical chips and micro-nano optical components, and carry out the research and development and industrialization of optical transceiver modules and engines, optical processing modules, laser radars and gyroscopes, and supporting electronic chip devices.

At the same time, the plan proposes to lay out pilot verification platforms around key areas and common needs of the photonics industry, promote achievement verification, process optimization, equipment selection, technology integration, accelerate new product development and industrial applications; promote the penetration of photonics technology into key areas such as artificial intelligence, new communications, ubiquitous terminals, industrial manufacturing, medical health, high-end manufacturing, and urban security.

Key layout directions such as optical chips and micro-nano optics

In the column of "Photonic Key Technologies and Product Research and Development", the "Plan" further clarifies the key construction contents in four aspects:

Micro-nano processing and manufacturing technology platform: Promote the construction of manufacturing technology platforms such as compound semiconductors of 6 inches and above, optical micro-electromechanical systems of 8 inches and above, and micro-nano optical superstructure surfaces of 12 inches and above.

Optoelectronic fusion integration process platform: Focus on improving the low-cost large-scale mass production and multi-material system heterogeneous integration capabilities of 8-inch and above silicon-based optoelectronics, and breaking through the key technologies of multi-dimensional heterogeneous integration of 12-inch advanced processes.

Optical chips and devices: focus on the development of large-bandwidth, narrow linewidth, high-power lasers, high-power terahertz light sources, high-speed CMOS heterogeneous integrated micro-light emitting diode array devices for optical communications, ultrafast lasers, multi-port optical circuit switching devices, high-dimensional wavelength selective switches, multi-band integrated optical amplifiers, large-bandwidth detectors, single photon detectors, fiber optic sensors, infrared/ultraviolet and terahertz detectors, ultrafast third-generation image intensifiers, and optoelectronic co-packaged chips.

Micro-nano optical components: focus on the development of micro-nano optical superstructure surface components, high surface precision lenses/prisms, precision films, precision gratings, low-precision error Faraday rotators, and high-performance optical waveguide devices.

An important change in this plan is to incorporate technologies such as optical chips, silicon-based optoelectronics, heterogeneous integration, optoelectronic co-packaging, micro-nano optics and optical waveguides into the same industrial framework, while extending coverage to pilot verification and industrialization implementation.

This policy coordinates the deployment of communications photonics, sensing photonics, and imaging photonics technologies, with compound semiconductors and silicon photonics multi-dimensional heterogeneous integration as the core focus. It will also benefit the development of domestic industrial chains such as optical communications, lidar, optoelectronic sensing, and high-end optical components. The policy also emphasizes that the pilot verification platform must undertake the functions of achievement verification, process optimization, equipment selection, and technology integration, which is of great support to domestic optoelectronic companies in realizing technology from laboratories to mass production.