David Harame

From FDTD to Tape-Out: The State and Future of Photonic EDA

Sunday, November 8, 2026

AIM Photonics Chief Operating Officer David Harame will present at the IEEE Photonics Conference during the “From FDTD to Tape-Out: The State and Future of Photonic EDA” session on Sunday, November 8. The IEEE Photonics Conference’s topics cover a broad scope of technical areas within the photonics community and the interests of our members.

Session Description

Designing a photonic integrated circuit today feels like designing electronics in the 1980s: fragmented tools, limited automation and a verification workflow that relies more on expert intuition than systematic sign-off. While electronic EDA matured into a robust, standardized ecosystem over decades, photonic design tools remain scattered across incompatible platforms, with no agreed-upon PDK standard and a wide gap between simulation and manufacturable layout.

This session brings together leading EDA and design tool vendors spanning electromagnetic simulation, automated layout, design verification, and electronic-photonic co-design to take stock of where the industry stands and chart a realistic path forward. Through focused talks and a closing panel discussion, speakers will address the core bottlenecks holding photonic CAD back, what lessons from electronics actually transfer, and what the community must build or standardize to reach the next level of design maturity.