1. Purpose of the gate
Tape-out commits money and schedule: masks or shuttle slots, wafers and fab time. This gate confirms that the database sent is the one that was verified, that the foundry has accepted it, and that everything needed to learn from the wafers is ready, especially the test structures and the optical test setup.
For a shuttle, the gate is also a learning plan: what this run must teach the team before the product run, and how that learning will be measured.
What done means at this gate: the photonic database is released to the foundry on a shuttle or dedicated run and accepted, with the test structures and test access that wafer-level optical test needs.
The gate closes the Photonic MPW & Tape-out stage, which covers releasing the design to the photonic foundry, on a multi-project wafer shuttle for early cycles or on a dedicated run for product: final checks, fill and density, test structures for optical and process monitoring, the run booking and the foundry's acceptance of the database, with the electronic die released on its own process at the same time where the product has one.
10 more sections for registered members.