FononTech and the EIC Accelerator: Printing Chip Connections at Speed

FononTech, spun out of the Dutch research organisation TNO, which developed Impulse Printing at the Holst Centre in Eindhoven, and led by co-founders Rob Hendriks (CEO) and Fabien Bruning (CTO), makes Impulse Printing machines that transfer metal from a patterned plate to a chip substrate in a single heat pulse, printing thousands of interconnects in parallel. Its EIC Accelerator project receives an EU contribution of €2,445,036 and runs from January 2025 to December 2026, according to CORDIS. It aims to take the technology from TRL 5 to 7: scalable plate manufacturing, a production-ready printhead and validation with semiconductor packaging customers.

In the first year, the report says, plate manufacturing was scaled from 50 mm laboratory plates to 200 mm and transferred to an external production facility, with plates exceeding the minimum of 1,000 prints each, according to CORDIS. The printhead was redesigned for continuous production, and work with "a European semiconductor manufacturer" set baseline process parameters for one packaging application, with test prints within placement specification. Before the project began, FononTech had delivered its first machine "to a major semiconductor company", it said when it closed an €8.5 million seed round in May 2025, according to High Tech Campus Eindhoven.

Where FononTech Stands Now

FononTech's €8.5 million seed round was led by Sake Bosch, founder of Prime Ventures, with Innovation Industries, the Brabant Development Agency, TNO and SHIFT Invest, and counted the EIC grant alongside, according to Silicon Canals. The company said then it expected to close a new round later in 2025 to scale up with in-house production; none has been announced. Bosch spoke of "sales potential of €1 billion within 5 years". The customer that bought the first machine has not been named. Its Dutch accounts were not accessible in free sources.

The Technology: Stamping Metal Instead of Etching It

Chip packaging interconnects are usually made by lithography and etching, which wastes material and chemicals, or by nozzles that deposit one dot at a time, the EIC report says. Impulse Printing loads metal into a patterned plate with a built-in heater; a short pulse ejects all the dots onto the substrate at once. FononTech claims four orders of magnitude more throughput than sequential dispensing, and lower energy and material use. Engraved plates for features below 30 micrometres are in development.

What the EIC Award Promised, and What the Record Shows

The project runs to December 2026, so it is too early to judge. First-year progress matches the plan: bigger plates, outsourced plate production, a productised printhead and one customer process. Reaching TRL 7 means proving reliability in a customer's production environment; extended reliability testing was only being prepared.

1. Scalable plate manufacturingDelivered200 mm, external.
2. Production printheadRedesignedDocumentation ready.
3. Customer validationBaseline setOne manufacturer.
4. TRL 7 reliabilityPendingTesting prepared.

The Money

The award was blended finance, but the EIC Fund is not named among the seed investors and no EIC equity has been announced. FononTech's disclosed funding totals about €13 million including the grant.

What Cannot Be Checked

Why Europe Should Care

Advanced packaging is where much of the chip industry's progress now happens, and the EIC report frames Impulse Printing as a way for European manufacturers to adopt additive processes without losing throughput. Eindhoven's equipment cluster gives FononTech a natural home. It needs capital to build machines at volume.

The Verdict

FononTech and the EIC have not been asked for comment for this article. It is based entirely on public records and published statements, linked throughout.