Rinn Semiconductors 主任對愛爾蘭半導體業的願景

Prof Paul Townsend. Image: Rinn Network

Prof Paul Townsend tells us about his plans for the semiconductors research centre that sits within Research Ireland’s new Rinn Network.

Over the summer, seven new Research Ireland centres were launched to address key research areas deemed pertinent to the country’s scientific, medical, economic and technological development.

The centres belong to a national research network called ‘Rinn’ and between them are set to receive €460m in Government investments over the next eight years, supporting 577 research positions, developing more than 800 PhDs and collaborating with 17 research-performing organisations.

The seven Rinn research centres – dedicated to the fields of advanced therapies, AI, energy, medical devices, pharma and biopharma, quantum, and semiconductors – began their work in July, with each being led by directors who are experts in their sectors.

Rinn Semiconductors is set to receive nearly €71m of Government funding overall and is headed by Prof Paul Townsend, a photonics specialist in the School of Physics at University College Cork (UCC) and with Tyndall National Institute who was born and grew up in the UK.

“I studied physics at university, gaining a PhD from the University of Cambridge on the novel properties of polymers that behave as one-dimensional semiconductors,” he tells SiliconRepublic.com.

His subsequent work in industry included time spent at British Telecom on quantum cryptography, the then-emerging concept of exploiting quantum physics to secure information. This work, he explains, was ancestral to “the quantum information and computing revolution that we frequently read about” today.

“In 2003, I had the opportunity to move to Ireland with my family and colleagues to found a new group at UCC and Tyndall, working on optical fibre communication systems with funding from Science Foundation Ireland,” says Townsend.

Tasked then with supporting the development of the wider photonics research ecosystem and engagement with industry in Ireland, this has since become the focus of his time working with Tyndall as its head of photonics research.

“My ambition is to take this an exciting further step forward with Rinn Semiconductors,” says Townsend.

Vision and collaboration

The centre is set to focus on research and innovation in heterogeneously integrated semiconductor systems, and aims to lead Ireland’s response to the point at which traditional improvements in computer chips diminishes (the end of Moore’s Law scaling) by pioneering modular integrated circuit-based – or chiplet-based – semiconductor design and integration.

Chiplet architecture is a method of using multiple smaller modules to build a single larger processor for a more powerful end result.

The Rinn Semiconductors team will seek transformative advances in these technologies and to apply them in three main areas: future internet, sustainable energy and the environment, and digital healthcare.

“Today, semiconductor chips touch nearly every aspect of our daily lives; they are in phones, computers and medical technology,” notes Townsend. “Almost any problem you can think of – societal or technological – requires the use of semiconductors to provide a solution.

“This is also a technology where Ireland plays a leading role. We are home to a world-class semiconductor industry sector – with a 50-year operating history – that employs 20,000 people in more than 100 companies.

“The national semiconductor strategy, Silicon Island, aims to build upon this to position Ireland internationally as a hub of semiconductor excellence and to contribute to the EU Chips Act goal of growing the EU’s proportion of global semiconductor manufacturing output.”

Key elements of the Government’s Silicon Island strategy, he notes, include strengthening research capacity, supporting start-ups and spin-outs, and building a future-ready talent pipeline through education and skills programmes.

“Rinn Semiconductors is extremely well-positioned to make major contributions to the achievement of these goals,” he says.

Another “key objective” of the centre, according to Townsend, is “to foster deep collaboration across the seven universities and institutions involved” by leveraging the “world-class” semiconductor fabrication facilities and infrastructure at Tyndall.

The centre plans for what it calls “radical collaboration” with and between Dublin City University, Munster Technological University, Trinity College Dublin, Tyndall, UCC, University of Galway and University of Limerick.

This, it is hoped, will lead to “a cohesive ‘atom to systems’ value chain in Ireland, connecting everything from basic materials research through to complete technology solutions”, says Townsend.

The Rinn Network, in his view, offers the opportunity to leverage coordinated research at scale, which is “critical” to the development of complex technologies such as semiconductors.

“The significant scale of the industry collaborative research projects we have established in just the first two months of operation gives me great confidence that this vision can be realised.”

Leading, directing, researching

As centre director, Townsend is responsible for ensuring that his programme is “suitably prioritised, innovative, impactful, internationally leading in its focus areas and, critically, delivers on its mission and goals”.

He is also in charge of budgeting, and overseeing grant compliance and reporting.

“In addition, I take the lead on stakeholder and external relations management, and act as an advocate for the centre and its mission,” he says.

Another important part of his leadership role is “to ensure the centre is a beacon for attracting and developing talent at all levels from PhD students to senior principal investigators (PIs)” in order to “address the demand from industry for highly-skilled scientists and engineers, as well as to sustain the academic research ecosystem needed to supply these trainees and keep Ireland at the forefront of semiconductor research”.

Apart from the development and implementation of the centre’s scientific and operational strategy, Townsend – whose personal research background is in optical fibre communications and sensing – gets some hands-on time at Rinn Semiconductors, too.

“I am also an active PI in the centre, where my group focuses on developing new integrated semiconductor solutions for two main application areas: energy-efficient interconnect technologies for AI clusters in data centres, with the goal of constraining the overall power consumption of AI; and distributed acoustic sensing in optical fibre cables, where we target improved monitoring of undersea communication cables and offshore windfarm power cables to ensure resilience and protection.”

Joined-up thinking

Moving forward, Townsend says his Rinn centre is targeting progress in four main areas: research breakthroughs in semiconductor chiplet integration and packaging technologies; translation of these ideas into new manufacturable technologies and products; acting as a catalyst for talent development; and driving engaged research programmes with stakeholders for impact on policy and society.

The latter, he hopes, could include “addressing the early stages of the talent supply problem by working with teachers and policymakers on how to encourage more school and university students, particularly women, to take up physics and engineering subjects that can lead to a career in the semiconductor industry”.

Townsend notes, too, the potential of the overall network for fostering collaboration and shared progress across the seven cornerstone areas, and the prospect of creating “greater value and impact than could be achieved by a group of individual centres working in a less connected way”.

“The wider Rinn Network plan adds the exciting possibility for centres to work together on complex problems that can only be addressed through an interdisciplinary approach.

“I think the scale and ambition of the overall programme will also be a great attractor for external talent and a fantastic springboard for researchers already in Ireland to advance their careers.

An especially important goal to him on an individual level, he adds, would be “the development of the next generation of exciting, talented researchers who will take Ireland on to even greater success in the future”.

“I am very fortunate and proud to have had the opportunity to work in Ireland and to contribute at least somewhat to the development of the national research ecosystem.

“On the personal side, my wife and I and our two now-grown-up daughters all live happily in and around Cork – and wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.”

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