RoLA–FLEX is an industry driven project which provides innovative solutions to the existing OLAE challenges associated with performance and lifetime, through: (a) the fabrication and upscaling of organic semiconductors with high charge mobilities (up to 10 cm2/Vs) and high power conversion efficiencies (16% in OPV cell and 12% in OPV module); (b) the development of metal oxides for charge carrier selective contacts and metal nanoinks for highly conductive micropatterns with increased environmental stability; (c) the seamless incorporation of high speed laser digital processing in Roll-2-Roll OPV module fabrication and photolithography based OTFT manufacturing and (d) the demonstration of two TRL5+ OLAE prototypes enabled by the developed materials and innovative processes: 1. A smart energy platform for IoT devices powered by ITO-free and flexible OPVs operating at low indoor light conditions. 2. A new generation of bezel-less and fully bendable smart watches integrating FHD, ultra-bright OLCD/OTFT displays. RoLA-FLEX will advance all the aforementioned technologies to at least TRL5 within its timeframe. RoLA-FLEX will create an opportunity for a yearly increase in revenues of almost €400 M only 6 years after its end, accompanied by hundreds of new jobs. A timely investment in the early days of these new markets can ensure significant market share for the SMEs and Industries involved and greatly boost EU’s competitiveness globally.

Qu-Test is a partnership of European testbeds for quantum technology, which is composed of distributed infrastructures with globally unique equipment and competencies across Europe. The goal of the partnership is to provide European industry with the necessary support in terms of infrastructure and know-how to move faster to the market and create a robust supply chain for the quantum technology market. The partnership is aligned along three testbeds: quantum computing, quantum communication, quantum sensing. In more detail, the Quantum Computing Testbed will measure, characterise and validate cryogenic quantum devices, cryogenic qubits such as superconducting and semiconducting qubits, photonics qubits and ion traps provided by European industry, with an increasing service maturity and targeting larger quantum processors during the course of the FPA. The Quantum Communication Testbed will characterise devices for Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) and Quantum Random Number Generation (QRNG) and provide design and prototyping services to support innovation in the supply chain of quantum communication technologies. Finally, the Quantum Sensing Testbed will benchmark sensing and metrology instruments provided by industry and use a large suite of quantum sensors (clocks, gravimeters, magnetometers, imagers) to validate industrial use cases aiming at generating new business cases for quantum sensing and metrology devices. The three testbeds will be coordinated by a Single Entry Point (SEP) that will receive the requests of industry and direct them efficiently to the right testbed infrastructure. With additional services of IPR support, business coaching and innovation management, Qu-Test supports the European quantum industry with a holistic one-stop-shop to move the full ecosystem forward.

X-TREME 6G proposal relies on a unique industry led consortium to provide a foundational open microelectronics platform in Europe with the objective to create and design key disruptive next generation chiplets and chipsets for 6G use cases. The idea is to break-up the full potential of best-in-class Silicon BiCMOS, InP and heterogeneous 3D integration for high capacity radio access technologies such as wireless back-hauling at sub-TeraHertz frequencies, Joint Communication And Sensing, Non Terrestrial Networks and Network as a Sensor. New classes of chipsets will unleash the full potential of 6G and enable the emergence of new applications through specific developments for the underpinning novel microelectronic technologies. X-TREME 6G valorizes also resource efficient 6G algorithms and an ML/AI software toolbox for computationally efficient silicon-ready baseband extensions. Part of the SNS “Microelectronic Lighthouse” visionary initiative, the proposal’s ambition is to establish and maintain a sustainable open platform for the duration of the SNS program and beyond, to support 6G verticals. By nurturing the links with the emerging Chips JU pilot lines, the platform acts as a first fabric to accelerate joint initiatives between SNS and Chips JUs. In a nutshell, X-TREME 6G will provide tangible contributions towards an experimentation EU framework for 6G, demonstrating the full benefit of the newly developed chipsets and chiplets for a set of emerging 6G high potential use cases (wireless back-hauling, JCAS, NTN, NaS); while being open to dynamically support the emerging 6G ecosystem (SMEs, Industries, Service Providers, Government etc.) and evaluate additional 6G challenges and expectations. By strengthening and extending the 6G functionality and microelectronics supply chain, X-TREME 6G contributes towards a network-centric democratized and open 6G ecosystem able to release the current hyperscaler’s market embrace, while empowers European Industry at large.

Between 25 and > 60% of total energy transfer through building envelopes is driven by glass based components such as windows, glass facades and glass roofs. In winter, heating energy demand of buildings with high windows-to-wall ratio (WWR) in north- and east direction is up to 35% higher compared to buildings with only small windows. In summer, large windows and glass facades result in high heating of the building interior: cooling energy demand is increased by a factor ≈ 1.5 to 5 when WWR increases from 10% to 90%. Non-residential buildings often make use of large windows or glass facades for building-functional and representative reasons and therefore hardly suffer from increased energy demand. Switch2save targets active management of radiation energy transfer through glass-based building envelopes by integrating transparent energy smart materials with switchable total energy transmission values (g-value). Such materials are electro-chromic (EC) or thermo-chromic (TC) systems. Intelligent switching of those allows significant reduction of both heating energy demand in winter and cooling energy demand in summer. Switch2save’s unique and lightweight combined EC and TC smart insulating glass unit will be a breakthrough in performance (plus 20%); low-cost potential (minus 33% manufacturing cost) and increased design opportunities compared to state-of-the-art smart shading solutions. Switch2save prototypes will be demonstrated in two representative buildings – a hospital in Athens, Greece and an office building in Uppsala, Sweden by replacing > 50 windows and 200 m² glass façade area. Continuous monitoring of energy demand at thermal comfort levels inside the buildings for at least one year before and after TC/EC integration will verify energy saving potential of Switch2save solution. Switch2save increases the market and application potential of energy smart glass in buildings – targeting the whole building glass market of 4.7 billion square meters produced per year.

SHINE PV will develop alternative technological routes to PV production for Silicon Heterojunction and TOPCon solar cells, covering the three key steps in the back-end manufacturing: metallization, post-processing and interconnection. SHINE PV will demonstrate different flows and down-select the most promising ones in terms of cost of ownership and high volume manufacturing readiness. Advanced equipment at TRL7 with Industry 4.0 dedicated features, innovative materials and solutions will be developed. For the metallization, SHINE PV will introduce parallel dispensing and plating as High Volume Manufacturing (HVM) alternative processes to incumbent screen printing, with the objective of demonstrating the complete or partial replacement of Ag with Cu, a fundamental step to enable Tera-Watt scale production levels. Moreover, SHINE PV will increase the efficiency through cell post-processing by applying Light Soaking process in HVM and recover the cutting-induced losses by Edge Re-Passivation. For the module making step, the innovations in interconnection proposed are Twill and Shingling processes and HVM equipment. Both will leverage on the optimization of the metallization and post-processing steps and will demonstrate their potential in terms of superior electrical properties, aesthetics, reliability, and compatibility with premium module designs. The expectation of the project is to enable an increase of solar cell (or module) efficiency of 0.5% absolute versus the reference process with a simultaneous CoO reduction of 20%, due to reduced material costs and increased equipment productivity. SHINE PV project will demonstrate the integrated innovative processes and novel equipment both virtually and within physical pilots at industrial partners at TRL7. To our knowledge for all these technologies no production equipment is available for HVM worldwide, and we envision a great potential for a PV supply chain revamping in EU.