AKHETONICS

Let There Be Light

HOW OPTICAL PROCESSORS CAN MAKE THE COMPUTING INDUSTRY MORE SUSTAINABLE

LIGHT CAN TRANSPORT SEVERAL WAVELENGTHS SIMULTANEOUSLY AND ENCODE THEM INDIVIDUALLY WITH INFORMATION.

Sprind And Akhetonics

Why We Are Committed

Because optical data processing promises high speed and low energy consumption as well as makes sense in many variations and in extremely amount of places. Because the new chip can fill large gaps here. Because the application potential and the leverage effect are huge. Also because the chips can be developed, understood and built in Europe and can make the digital world a bit more (energy) efficient from here.

WHAT WE DO

Check, discover and unlock the potential for disruptive innovation. Activate networks, create access, open doors. We start a validation study, which also means: we give money. We already help overcome the first hurdles even with a small amount of money.

FIND PARTNERS – CREATE VISIBILITY

We have experts who know what and who you need to accomplish this task. We know someone who knows someone.

THE POTENTIAL WE SEE

A digital world in which huge amounts of data are processed and used all around us with minimal energy consumption in such a way that people are informed, transported and supported. Without wasting resources.

While other children read Harry Potter, Michael Kissner had especially liked the programming book “Code” by Charles Petzold. He knew at a young age that one day he would want to build a processor himself, even if he had never had an optical processor in mind at that time. He did not take the ‘Stargate’ series from the 90s for granted: “All the alien processors there were crystals that work with light. What nonsense!” Science fiction—until Microsoft announced at the end of 2019 that it had stored data in quartz glass, a ‘crystal’. His old enthusiasm was immediately kindled and Michael Kissner, who had meanwhile studied mathematical engineering and mathematical physics as well as received a doctorate in artificial intelligence, took advantage of the pandemic to finally delve into his childhood dream. “There have been many approaches for optical computers over the past 40 years,” Dr. Kissner reported, who was most recently active in the field of cybersecurity, “but the approaches were only too much from the bottom up. But I considered this differently: This is, what an optical processor must be able to do. And if it has to be able to do that, then the transistor has to look like that, and then I need these physical effects. Only then did I start looking for an optical transistor that would do that.” That is how Dr. Kissner got to know his co-founder, Dr. Leonardo del Bino. “I read hundreds of papers about optical transistor designs. What fit perfectly was Leonardo’s.”

“Light is reluctant to interact with light. It is much easier to process data about electrons that repel each other, but there are always high losses due to resistances,” Kissner stated enthusiastically, who moved to Germany at the age of 18 and grew up in Iran, Indonesia and Singapore. “Even people absorb more than 80 percent of all information with their eyes. Information density is infinitely greater with light.”

THE CRUX OF THE MATTER: ANIMATE LIGHT TO INTERACT

Light can transport several wavelengths simultaneously and encode them individually with information. The approach is essentially based on the idea of using optical nodes as logic circuits. “The information we process is present in the form of light. We process light without converting it into an electronic signal and back again,” the Italian-born del Bino explained. “Our processor can be integrated into any application, but at the beginning it is particularly useful for devices that receive and transmit information in the form of light, for example, in the network area of routers and switches.” Animating light to interact efficiently is the crux of the matter. It does work in theory. Now it is necessary to put it to the test in practice and to build prototypes. “A light processor saves an infinite amount of energy and can process much more data much faster, with no latency due to the conversion,” Dr. del Bino explained. As a result, this significantly reduces power and cooling requirements compared to conventional processors.

Environmental friendliness is a key motivator for the founders. Electronic processors consume immense amounts of ultra-pure water for flushing in production. The optical variant, on the other hand, does not have so many process steps, is more robust and requires much less water. “We want to offer an alternative that is more sustainable, but we will not be the smallest.” In addition, the technology can be manufactured in Europe. “We are planning chips in the order of 130 nanometers, and there are already many factories producing them here,” del Bino stated, who specializes in materials science and non-linear photonics.

The five-member team at Akhetonics is hoping for similar efforts in the start-up scene. There are numerous approaches for optical computers in the quantum and analog field. “There is quite a lot of hype. Digitally, however, we are one of the few who are trying to build an optical processor, but collaboration is always desirable.”

Michael Kissner laughed: “What we do is more on the janitorial level and not sexy, but a digital optical processor is the most versatile and can cover many fields, also in the field of AI.” The entire technical infrastructure would then have to follow suit. “I believe that this is the only right step, because most of the things we use are optical anyway: network traffic, webcam, screen, we have an optical mouse, a laser printer—laser light is simply used all over the place and converted into electronics. Therefore: let laser light be laser light and let us make everything optical.”