California, USA & Eindhoven, the Netherlands, January 19, 2026 -- Photonic chip industry accelerator PhotonDelta has launched its second global engineering contest in collaboration with Wevolver, the world’s number one global knowledge and community platform for engineers, to stimulate the creation of new applications for photonic chips that tackle global challenges.  

The contest builds on the success of last year’s competition, which saw MIT spin-off Perceptra triumph with its groundbreaking photonic chip-based Raman sensor for real-time chemical monitoring. Perceptra received €1.2 million in investments from PhotonDelta, together with access to up to  €50,000 worth of services to help bring the concept into reality. The company will open an R&D facility in the Netherlands to scale photonic sensing for chemical monitoring.

Launched on 19 January at PIC Summit USA 2026, the Global Photonics Engineering Contest is a competition for innovative ideas for photonic chip-based solutions that address some of the world’s most pressing societal and technical challenges, from combating climate change and advancing healthcare to addressing energy sustainability challenges. The second edition of the contest will focus on photonic chip-based applications within communication and computing, imaging, sensing and wireless.  

Engineers and startups are invited to submit concepts and designs which have the capacity to revolutionise fields such as healthcare, autonomous vehicles, AI and agriculture by, for example, enabling advanced sensors for earlier diagnostics, safer infrastructure, or more efficient food production. The ultimate goal of the contest is to discover future applications in segments that are yet to be invented.

The winner will receive up to €100,000 worth of services to bring their idea to life, as well as consideration for investment of up to €2 million by PhotonDelta. In addition, the winner will receive two tickets, including flights and hotel and the opportunity to present on the PIC Summit Europe 2026 main stage.  

PIC Summit USA, organised by PhotonDelta, sees more than 500 leaders and 30 exhibitors from the global photonic chip and semicon industry gathering to discuss a range of key topics impacting the sector. A key focus will be on debating optical and photonic architectures for AI-scale computing and next-generation datacenter connectivity. Among the 25 featured speakers are Andy Bechtolsheim, Founder & Chief Architect, Arista Networks; Nicholas Harris, Founder & CEO, Lightmatter; Ashkan Seyedi, Director of Networking, NVIDIA; and David Lazovsky, Founder & CEO, Celestial AI.

Eelko Brinkhof, CEO at PhotonDelta, said: “There is no better place to launch this contest than at PIC Summit USA, which sees more than 500 leading industry figures come together to help drive the photonics industry forward. There will be vigorous debates across a range of issues, with a special focus on the role of photonic chips within AI-scale computing and next-generation data centre connectivity.

“Last year’s Global Photonics Engineering Contest saw scores of highly innovative and exciting entrants. We are delighted to build on this success and launch an expanded contest aimed at discovering and supporting an even wider array of potentially game-changing applications for photonic technology.”  

The promotion of the 2025 contest reached a huge audience through press coverage and articles, resulting in 800,000 impressions and 55,000 engagements, as well as around 200 social media posts which reached more than 100,000 people.

The Global Photonics Engineering Contest is open to startups, established companies, engineers, researchers, students, and academic organisations working on innovative photonic chip applications.  

Submissions will be open until 19 June 2026, with the winner and runners-up announced in August.

Contest entries will be judged on the level of innovation, technical and commercial feasibility, and how effectively the design addresses current industry challenges. Participants are required to submit detailed descriptions of their projects, including team information and supporting visuals or videos. A jury panel of experts from the photonic chip industry will review the submissions.