Mission

Lightmotif's mission is to provide a combination of state-of-the-art ultrashort pulse laser micromachining systems and carefully developed laser processes that enables our customers to make exciting new products; or simply gives them a better way of making their existing products.

Vision

Building a micromachining system is more than simply picking the right components. We believe that a good laser micromachining system should be built up out of high quality hardware components and flexible and/or highly automated control software; and that all parts need to be tightly integrated in order to achieve machining with accurate and reproducible results.

We think it's best to do one thing really well; that's why we focus on the technology needed for ultrashort pulse laser micromachining and surface texturing and use this knowledge to develop new applications together with our customers. We communicate openly with our customers and focus on their requirements so that we can work towards meaningful and realistic specifications; and we never promise anything that we can't deliver.

We want to design and build the best systems available and develop advanced and innovative processes. That's why we will continue to improve our existing technology; and we will keep investing in research and development of new technologies.

History

Lightmotif was founded in 2008 as a spin-off company of the University of Twente and the Materials Innovation Institute (M2i). By combining their knowledge and experience in ultrashort pulse laser processing, software development, and mechanical engineering, the founders wanted to deliver better laser processes and machines. In 2009 the company moved into its own building at the Business and Science Park in Enschede, where a modern applications laboratory and production facility has been established in a cleanroom environment.

During the first years Lightmotif concentrated on technology development. This resulted in a flexible micromachining concept that uses advanced control software developed specifically for laser micromachining. With this system large and complex jobs can be executed, also on 3D curved surfaces. Even with this considerable effort spent on research and development the overall business has been profitable.

In 2012 Lightmotif started selling systems based on the technology that was developed during the first years. With this step the company can fully support customers from process development to industrial use, either by offering job-shop services or by selling a production system.