The tools behind waveguide production play a critical role in the visual consistency and performance of AR glasses. Over years of hands-on development and manufacturing, our teams have learned that the best combination of equipment can shape outcomes as much as design decisions.
This experience has made us highly specialized in evaluating and engineering machinery that supports our waveguide production processes.
By thoughtfully selecting, adapting, and building machinery to match our needs, we can create a more controlled and reliable manufacturing environment.
Machinery Types
Waveguide manufacturing relies on a mix of commercial and customized equipment. Rather than defaulting to one approach, we evaluate each process step and determine which type of equipment best supports our team’s long-term production goals.
Off-the-Shelf
Some of our production stages are supported by equipment originally designed for other industries, like semiconductors and consumer electronics. When this equipment meets our standards, we integrate them into our waveguide manufacturing processes with carefully defined operating parameters.
These tools provide a stable foundation for repeatable steps and allow us to build on proven technologies where they already perform well.
Slightly Customized
In other cases, commercial tools provide a strong foundation but require targeted adjustments to fit our needs. Our teams refine hardware and software to better align with the precision and coordination required in our waveguide fabrication.
These modifications help close any gaps between standard machinery capabilities and the level of control our processes demand.
A few examples of slightly customized tools include high-resolution camera systems that scan our waveguides for any defects, waveguide assessment machinery that can measure down to the nanometer, and UV curing systems that enable rapid, precision bonding of coatings and waveguide elements.
Another customization approach involves mounting commercial hardware onto our equipment and controlling it with our software so it operates in sync with other machine components.
Fully Customized
For our most sensitive or specialized steps, we develop equipment designed for our specific requirements and performance targets.
Our nano-imprint equipment is core to our waveguide manufacturing process. It creates gradient-depth diffractive nano features in a single pass with controlled residual layers allowing for uniform, high-efficiency waveguides. While other manufacturers may also use nano-imprint processes, theirs require multiple passes through their lithography or etch machines to achieve similar performance.
In addition to using custom machines for material applications, we also use them for testing. For example, we created equipment to measure how well our eyepieces transfer the output images from our projector onto the wearer’s eye. By developing this equipment internally, we were able to deploy the solution more quickly than if we had sourced a third party, and we were able to ensure the tool integrated into our existing machinery and manufacturing workflows.
Waveguide production is an extremely technical process that requires tight control at every step. Knowing when to use, adapt, or build equipment ensures that each stage performs as intended, resulting in more consistent, high-quality waveguides.
Learn how we use these machines in our Integrated Waveguide Manufacturing story.