Openchip, the technological revolution in Europe (and Catalonia)
The Catalan chip company has received €111 million from the Next Generation Fund.
BarcelonaThe time of the covid was also the time in which a new dictionary filled with words like was forged in the popular imagination pandemic, coronavirus, masks and even, chips and semiconductorsThe shortage of microelectronic components, such as these chips, suddenly became a global and local problem. Society then learned that these components were essential to keep the economy moving forward, and alarm bells started ringing. This is where the story of Openchip, commonly known as the Catalan Nvidia (and European), although its managers don't quite like this definition.
"The chip shortage led to the shutdown of factories like Seat and many others across Europe, and it was because of this situation, and because the European Next Generation funds were also due, that the ministries asked society to submit projects in this area," explains Marc Fernández, director. It was then that the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC) and GTD, the technology-critical software group, jointly presented the Openchip project. "The idea was to do something to prevent this from happening again in the future," says Fernández.
After a long process and "passing many very tough tests," the European Union deemed Openchip "an important project of interest." Now that it has received European approval, the company has applied for the Spanish PERTE Chip program to receive government funding. Openchip is the fourth Catalan organization to receive the most Next Generation funding, a total of €111 million, behind Adamo, Barcelona City Council, and the BSC. The money arrived in January 2024, and with it, trained and talented people from around the world, like Francesc Guim, its CEO. In just over a year, they already have 170 employees.
"Myself and the rest of the management team are people who have been working for more than two decades in the world of semiconductors or technology, and most have been working for American companies. I myself have 600 patents, which I made when I was very consolidated and professional, and this project comes at a time in my professional career when I want to be able to reverse the knowledge we have created abroad and bring it home," explains Guim.
The European bet
The European commitment to Openchip is ambitious because it's an "extremely expensive" technology, says Guim. Making chips isn't cheap: bringing a chip to the factory costs 25 million euros, buying licenses costs tens of millions of euros, and talent in the sector is expensive. But this commitment makes even more sense given the current situation, in which Donald Trump's tariff policy highlights Europe's need to make a move in the technological field. "Our goal is to try to provide the market with alternative products to what's currently available, with the European seal, and the idea is to hit the market by the end of 2027," says the CEO.
"This goes far beyond Openchip; it's a European project where we have to work in a coordinated manner with all other parts of Europe. We are working together with Imec, with Submer (a Catalan company that deals with date centers), with companies that design boards, etc. From our humble point of view, it's about bringing a critical part, which is the chips and software, but working with the ecosystem to be able to jointly enter the gigafactories," Guim explains.
Zero-kilometer technology
Openchip began as a very specific project to make chips and software, but it has grown not only internally but especially through synergies with other European companies. "We're often asked who our competitors are at the European level, but we always say we don't have competitors, but rather partners. Ultimately, what we need to do is activate zero-mile consumption with zero-mile components and try to ensure that all the parts needed to make the final product are European," explains the CEO.
"This purchase of European technology is more important than allocating money to research," affirms Fernández. "We must be aware that what we're going to buy is that zero-mile because, in the end, no matter how much money there is for research, we need customers, and the government itself can be the first," he adds.
"Rather than being the Nvidia of Europe, what I'm saying is that Europe should be the Nvidia of Europe. If we can define a European Nvidia, it should be a group of European companies that join forces," they explain. In fact, from a technological perspective, Openchip is trying to distance itself from how the United States is developing technology: "There, they don't care about sustainability or energy consumption; they want to make everything bigger and more powerful," they criticize. "The technology we develop is the opposite: it's about thinking about how we can make artificial intelligence more sustainable while maintaining the same levels of performance," Guim explains. "We are convinced that another way of creating artificial intelligence is possible, and we want to create it in a European way, adopting European values," he affirms.