More high-tech in Silicon Saxony

Jenoptik is investing in new and state-of-the-art production facility for micro-optics and sensors. Discover more about the construction project and its progress, about the groundbreaking ceremony and the future design of the high-tech manufacturing facility.

Construction work on the Jenoptik Group’s new high-tech fab at Dresden Airport Park began on September 6, 2022 with a groundbreaking ceremony attended by Saxony’s Minister-President Michael Kretschmer and Mayor Stephan Kühn, Dresden’s Councillor for Urban Development, Construction, Transport and Real Estate. The two politicians ceremonially broke ground together with Jenoptik CEO Stefan Traeger and then CFO Hans-Dieter Schumacher and other representatives of the photonics group.

Exactly one year after the groundbreaking ceremony, Jenoptik celebrated the topping-out ceremony for its new high-tech factory on September 6, 2023. In addition to the parties involved in the construction, Jenoptik employees and neighboring companies from the industrial park were also present to join us in celebrating this milestone.

As construction progresses, the completion of the building sections is planned for the first half of 2024. This will be followed by the interior work in the second half of 2024. Production in the new factory is scheduled to start at the beginning of 2025.

Watch the progress on the construction site

May 2024: Well tempered into the next phase thanks to cooling machines

Our new fab is taking shape, both inside and outside, and the technical building equipment is being installed step by step. With the heating system already in operation, it's now time for three huge, highly efficient chillers to be installed at their dedicated location on the roof of the fab. This means that the interior fit-out of the clean-room environment can now enter the hot – or rather – the well-cooled next phase. Even now, during the construction and installation of the clean rooms, constant temperatures and therefore air conditioning during the construction phase are very important.

In addition to the interior work, the exterior facade is also currently being designed. It will be clad in metallic gray sheet metal, which will later give the clean room building a smooth, technical appearance. The office building will be completely white.

This video (left) gives you an insight into the ongoing work.

January 2024: Interior work has started

The construction site of our new high-tech factory in Dresden is on schedule. The façade is sealed, the windows are glazed, in short, the building is ready for interior design. Easy access to the building is provided through the newly prepared logistics access road, which was completed before Christmas 2023.

The project team now has to coordinate more than 20 trades on the construction site. At times, there are more than 100 construction workers on site. The supply lines for heating/cooling, ventilation, sanitation, fire protection and electricity are currently being installed. At the same time, the walls, floors and ceilings of the future fab are being specially coated. All surfaces must be particularly smooth so that no particles adhere later.

July 2023: Shell construction with ventilation system

February 2023: Pouring the base plate

April 2023: The first floor was built

November 2022: Drilling the foundation piles

Our new factory will be ready for manufacturing in 2025. We're confident to start operation as scheduled and invite you to become part of our Jenoptik team in Dresden today!

To our vacancies

Extremely demanding construction and manufacturing environment

Jenoptik is investing more than 70 million euros in the new high-tech fab with a total of 11,000 square meters of net floor space, including 2,000 square meters for clean room production. Production is scheduled to start at the beginning of 2025.

The new high-tech fab will manufacture micro-optics and sensors, which are mainly used in semiconductor lithography systems. Production will take place in clean room classes ISO 5 and 3, which also meet the highest requirements for vibration-free production and temperature stability. Comprehensive vibration monitoring is also in place during the construction of the fab in order to not disrupt the production processes of neighboring companies in the industrial park.

High environmental standards taken into account

In addition to precise manufacturing conditions, the high-tech fab also meets high environmental standards: Jenoptik aims to meet the "KfW 40 Standard" and "LEED Gold Standard Certification", currently the most comprehensive and stringent building criteria in terms of sustainability.

To achieve this, comprehensive environmentally friendly measures are planned, such as a photovoltaic system, recycled materials during construction, a highly efficient building envelope including greening, cold and heat recovery, and intelligent control technology.

Dresden as a major micro-optics location

Jenoptik has been active in Dresden since 2007 and currently has around 60 employees there. With the new production facility, Jenoptik will consolidate manufacturing in Dresden, which is currently spread across several smaller external locations.

The photonics group is creating 60 additional high-quality jobs and increasing its local workforce to a total of well over 120 employees. In addition to Dresden, Jenoptik also manufactures its high-precision and micro-optics at the Thuringian sites Jena and Triptis (polymer optics), in Heerbrugg, Switzerland, as well as in Jupiter (Florida) and Huntsville (Alabama), USA.

Photonics as a growth driver

Optics & sensors for the semiconductor equipment industry as well as other sectors such as medical technology & life sciences or IT infrastructures & communications are key growth drivers for Jenoptik. As a photonics group, Jenoptik is focusing on expanding these business areas, which are expected to generate around 75 percent of the 1.2 billion euros in revenue targeted by 2025.

With the new fab, Jenoptik is meeting the rapidly growing demand for photonic solutions. Industry experts predict further growth for the semiconductor equipment industry – the main customer of the new fab’s products – in the next years.

An important area of application for micro-optics is the semiconductor equipment industry. For example, micro-optical sensors enable the exact positioning of wafers during lithographic processes for chip production. Applications include both DUV and EUV lithography.

Micro-optics and micro-optical sensors are characterized by highest precision in smallest space and very flat design. They direct light by means of micro- and nanostructures and – unlike classical optics – are manufactured in a lithography process similar to semiconductor production. In addition to chip production, they are used in other primarily technological manufacturing processes that require highly precise and or very flexible positioning of light for process steps, for example in laser material processing, or quality assurance, for example in inspection processes. The very light and small individual components, often only a few micrometers in size, can be combined to form miniaturized scanning and switching systems with flexible multiple applications.

Take a closer look at the future high-tech factory in the video!

Some key facts about our future high-tech location:

Project & partners

Planning: RSE Architekten Ingenieure GmbH, Stuttgart, Germany
General and technical building services planning: CRC Clean Room Consulting GmbH, Freiburg, Germany
Construction: individual awarding of the trades