We build our own
chip fab tools.
Student-built lithography, deposition and etching. Chip fabrication, made accessible.
Build the fab, not just the chip.
A student group at TU Munich, affiliated with HackerFab. We build our own tools for every step of chip fabrication and run the full process on real wafers, no cleanroom. Where universities stop at simulation, we put the actual machines in students' hands.
Every chip fab comes down to the same four processes. We build tools for all of them.
Lithography
Writing the circuit pattern onto the wafer with light.
Deposition
Laying down thin films of metal and other materials.
Etching
Carving those patterns into the wafer surface.
Characterisation
Measuring what we made to see if it worked.
Every tool, student-built.
Schematics, firmware and build logs are open on GitHub.
LithoStepper v2.1
Maskless UV lithography
Prints micron-scale circuit patterns straight onto a wafer with UV light, no photomask needed.
ThermoEvap-1
Thermal evaporator
Coats wafers with ultra-thin metal films by evaporating aluminium and chromium in vacuum.
MicroRIE
Reactive ion etcher
Etches fine, vertical structures into silicon with a reactive plasma.
The case for doing this now.
Over 90% of the world’s most advanced chips are produced on a single island. One disruption there could stall the entire global electronics industry.
The EU Chips Act aims to more than double Europe’s share of global chip production by 2030, backed by €43 billion in public and private funding.
Europe’s semiconductor sector needs tens of thousands more engineers, yet almost no university gives students hands-on fabrication experience.
A low-cost, fully open-source fab that fits in a university lab, so any student can learn chip-making by building and running the tools themselves.
Get your hands dirty.
Literally.
Looking for builders who want to make real fabrication tools. No experience needed. Just curiosity and drive.
No formal application.
Send max. 3 sentences: who you are, what you've built, and why you want to contribute.
Mechanical
Stages, frames, vacuum chambers. CAD and hands-on build.
Electrical / Firmware
Motor control, sensor readout, custom PCBs.
Process
Spin coating, exposure doses, wet chemistry.
Software / CV
Pattern generation, alignment, machine control.
Build with us, or just
clone the repo.
Join, replicate a machine, or collaborate. Reach out. Everything we build is open.