Within this project, Morphotonics has the aim of showing a scalable, stable and reproducible process for the manufacturing of AR waveguides. This starts by the improvement activities on the current scalability capabilities. Followed by further development on materials and processes, and finally, a demonstration of a pilot run with a quality standard, demonstrating that the R2P technology can deliver quality and quantity.
Morphotonics has made progress on the different processes relevant to the R2P NIL. One example is on the surface preparation of the substrate before imprinting, which is critical for the uniformity and visual results of the waveguide. A plasma cleaning method was selected, and primer formulations and machine processes were developed. Additionally, to fully exploit the large are NIL capability, the upscaling (cost-effective multiple up imprint) of the waveguides was improved for layer uniformity. In order to produce high quality replicas, the flexible stamp should have adequate release properties, Morphotonics has improved its resin formulation to be able imprint the demanding AR textures (the latter was also qualified by a customer).
Quality control is an essential part of a foundry, a full quality control procedure for the AR waveguides has been developed. The relevant tools have been installed, among them a tool for functional tests such as image contrast and brightness uniformity and an atomic force microscope to measure the shape fidelity and layer thickness of the imprints.
The development activities were also partly realized with the collaboration of partners, these companies are specialized in techniques that combined with R2P can deliver relevant results, here we can mention the post-processing of waveguides such as singulation and dry-etching.
A main achievement within the first year of this project is the confirmation from a partner (3rd party) that Morphotonics technology is on par with competitors, with an additional cost advantage using the NIL R2P technology. Additionally, funding for a pilot-foundry has been secured having two new investors focused AR on board (3M and the BOM).
