On 8 October 2002, Netherlands contractor Royal Philips Electronics announced the opening of the Philips Delft Design Centre (PDDC) at Delft, Holland.
A cooperative venture with Delft University of Technology (DUT), Philips cites the new facility as a symbol of its commitment to investing in the future of standard analogue semiconductor technology and to providing the best possible learning environment for electronic engineering students.
Initially, the PDDC will have three permanent Philips employees (dedicated to design work in support of standard analogue Integrated Circuit (IC) developments) and three professors, two PhD students and two MSc students from DUT. The PDDC project builds on a 17-year relationship between Philips and DUT and is designed to capitalise on DUT's prowess in the analogue field. The emphasis on analogue design is said to reflect the importance of analogue devices (such as interface and power management ICs) to the development of digital applications. Looking to the future, Philips engineers from France, the Netherlands and the USA will be able to rotate through the facility to build competence and there is the expectation that the PDDC will have grown to 30 full-time employees by 2005-2007.