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The 4X200G PIC chip "is progress" so it is probably somewhere in the manufacturing phase at present and we know that can take months. Where in the cycle? Probably not at the beginning because when we heard that from Dr. Lebby it was already known for some amount of time. From experience we don't find out things in real time nor should we expect that.
They have had a lot of time to be engaged with one or more transceiver partners so I wonder about if they would announce a transceiver connecting 4 of the 200G modulators in a typical package solution well before the 4X200G chip comes out. If there is significant demand, a traditional packaged set of modulators would help support the rollout.
30 Million is the minimum for the Russell microcap. It is 250 million for the Russell 2000.
Based on the timing of our share price decline, it matches the timeframe of the Russell reconstitution research. I have no doubt the company will commercialize but there has been the rumors spread that we won't by the people who want the share price lower. I would think the Russell folks know better than to go on rumors. I believe we will be OK as long as the share price does not get to low 2s. The posters representing the shorts have been predicting the price going to 2 for quite a while, wishful thinking I believe. If we were deleted from the index, it would be wild short term, rapid down, followed by recovery. How much recovery? It will be up to Michael Lebby to produce more than just promises. We really need news of substance.
Since January 1, the share price has spent the vast majority of time hovering in the 4s. If there was a brief breach to the upper 3s it was short lived. Most of us saw a share price of 4 as the bottom. The last time the share price was 4 was on May 14. The very good news about technological progress coming out of the major conferences failed to give a real boost to the share price as selling pressure had continued, led by orchestrated, coordinated sells by short sellers which has weighed on shareholder sentiment to encourage further selling. Here we are in the upper 2s which seems ludicrous to knowledgeable longs.
One factor I have been mulling over is the fact that the Russell 2000 rebalance will be final June 28. The average market cap in the Russell 2000 is 4.8 Billion (which is blown higher by the rapid rise of SMCI to 45 Billion). The median market cap is more important and is 960 million. Our market cap is around 340 million. The minimum to be in the index is around 250 million but a stock can be replaced if it is somewhat above that if there are questions about commercializing or if there are liquidity problems affecting trading. Russell slowly releases preliminary changes on 5/24, 5/31, 6/7, 6/14, 6/21 and the final date setting the index, 6/28.
If I was a short, looking to Russell deletions to include LWLG as a possible endgame to successfully exit my short position would be the best scenario. Institutions that follow the index would be selling large amounts of shares at low prices from which shorts could cover. I would imagine that they have hoped to drive the stock price down even lower than what it is now but enough buying has come in to offset that. Kudos to those shareholders that have been buying. Getting LWLG booted from the index would be like winning the lottery for the short sellers.
Technically we are not out of the woods yet but our market cap isn't that close to the minimum to get into the index. There are 3 more dates of announced changes before the index is finalized. I believe institutions get some heads up on changes to begin adjusting their index selling or buying as needed. What I am hoping for is getting past the next few weeks where there still could be selling pressure prior to the Russell finalization. After that we might begin to see some real short covering and a rise in the stock price.
We always can learn things from history.
In 2019 Mellanox, an Israeli company, was acquired by NVDA for what became a 7 billion dollar transaction. NVDA was one of several customers of Mellanox who supplied networking adapters, switches, routers and cabling that utilized InfiniBand technology which at the time was starting to grow in significance to the incumbent and dominant Ethernet technologies. NVDA battled Intel for the acquisition. It was becoming evident that InfiniBand technology would support the increasing use of High Performance Computing which could better aggregate the computing power of multiple computers and perform many operations in less time. The Data Center industry was moving to numerous smaller servers that were interconnected for supporting more complex computations. Ethernet technology offered a bottleneck compared to InfiniBand which allowed for better interconnections between servers resulting in higher bandwidth, lower latency and thus faster transmission.
Mellanox was valued around 3 billion as a company selling InfiniBand products to NVDA, Intel and other companies at the time of the acquisition but NVDA and Intel saw the likely rapid growth that was coming as HPC was being utilized more and more in data centers but NVDA appeared to benefit the most as its GPUs critically needed InfiniBand for optical performance and to accelerate their use. NVDA didn't want Intel to get the technology as there was a bidding war.
NVDA's Jensen Huang saw what was needed to really allow GPUs to become critical in data centers and that was to allow computing and data to run faster and allow numerous chips to talk to each other and speed computations. The faster InfiniBand could be taken up in data centers the more GPUs would be needed for even faster computing which would be necessary in applications like AI. NVDA has control of a technology that was starting to grow into the market as the demand for it compared to incumbent technology (Ethernet) was appearing to broaden. InfiniBand is a complementary technology to NVDAs main income source, GPUs.
Lesson learned is that if a technology is appearing to be needed for an industry as big as the data center market for it to move to the next area of growth and efficiency, it will be utilized instead of the incumbent technologies. It won't happen until it becomes clear other competing technologies cannot do what it does as well. Once proven in real world applications to do what it is advertised to do, it becomes an acquisition target based on future growth and likely dominance especially if it enhances the growth of the acquirer's products.
It is still early for LWLG as it still has to get its modulators into data centers and prove its worth in overcoming the bottleneck that is going to grow in transmission from the data centers as HPC and GPUs powering it demands faster transmission out of the data centers. Once that becomes clear there will be multiple acquirers considering LWLG as a target. The companies who have the most to gain will be the most aggressive in bidding when that happens.
It is a rebuttal by Dr. Lebby on the share price and doubts spread from folks such as yourself. He is telling people he is negotiating with the big companies and 2024 will see deals.
The value proposition of Lightwave's polymers added to pics gets clearer all the time with consistent stability measures growing longer and longer and achieving volume scale manufacturing of of 200G PAM 4 modulators running at or under 1V. There is not other materials that can be added in heterogenous integration that comes close to this and is ready for deployment in the coming upgrade cycles. We have one announced foundry capable of supplying large volumes of these modulators. What about the other foundries who have been working with LWLG for the last 2-3 years?
Just because we have not heard as yet doesn't mean other foundries are not yet ready. The ability to introduce polymers into the manufacturing process on 200mm foundry equipment can occur with a foundry's current equipment so in theory it is not overly complicated if it can be accomplished with a relatively smaller foundry on similar equipment working on it for a year with the help of our smart LWLG team of engineers. Larger foundries may or may not behind AMF. Several larger foundries more than likely have completed PDKs and packaging options are in the works for the 200G PAM 4 modulator chips either in the form of the modulator array chip or through standard packaging with a transceiver partner. Perhaps the first transceiver announced will be with standard post foundry packaging but only if there is a customer that wants it.
In addition, large foundries are likely tied to large customers who have expectations on manufacturing cycles run and subsequent testing which we know takes time. LWLG is not driving the timing as much as customers and their expectations are driving timing of orders. Foundries tied to a large customer are likely wanting approval from that large customer to announce involvement because the customer is satisfied and made a commitment to order. Competition among transceiver manufacturers, among foundries and among customers wanting to begin deploying is likely there and can lead to wanting to remain under NDAs until closer to deployment. How much so I cannot say but I believe it plays a role. We must keep in mind that moving to using polymers in chips is a completely new thing that could have a large effect on what technology is used in the coming years. Companies in competition can gain 12-18 months ahead of competition by not disclosing a commitment to a new technology until closer to deployment.
I can only imagine, as I have done in this post, some of the complex, integrating factors that effect disclosure of details as we march along to commercialization like an army patrol hidden in the trees.
The share price has been falling since the ASM where Dr. Lebby said the company is still on track but hedged on guidance regarding the modular array chip for 800G transceivers saying it was "in progress". I don't know what that really means other than it will come and it still can come soon even if someone else wants to interpret it as not coming in the near future. He also said tier-1s want more data. The longer we go from the December 4 guidance on deals in the short term the more anxiety there is for some in the shareholder base. All of this has allowed traders and shorts to use high frequency trading, shorting and covering to drive the price down leading to some shareholders to sell. It will be interesting to see what the short count is. Shareholder fatigue holding for many years may behind some of the selling especially in the weakness of the share price of late. Some shareholders may have sold hoping to get back in with news. Michael Lebby says we are commercializing but there is no news released about specifics. No wonder short sellers are complacent in the control of the share price they have had.
I believe anyone shorting LWLG is playing a dangerous game. Complacency by the shorts over the past 18 months as the stock price drifted lower and lower with shorting more and more is showing itself. The short interest ratio (days to cover) is the Damocles sword hanging over the head of the shorts meaning they have control and paper profits but it can be gone in a few days time with commercialization news of substance. With such news, new buyers come in, former shareholders try and buy back in and current shareholders hold recognizing the significance of the news and now short sellers are faced with strong competition for shares and the chance of a short squeeze. The days to cover has been been in the 30s and recently the 40s. It is calculated on average daily volume but much of the volume is buys and sells amongst the shorts and market makers so that would suggest that the days to cover is even higher and that is what makes it so dangerous for shorts who aren't covering at these low prices.. I am not selling a single share and have added over the past month.
Yes proto, people need to be reminded of this:
"Only two years ago, many market analysist covering data centers and more specifically pluggable optical transceivers, were forecasting huge growth in 400Gbps as the main vehicle for client side hyperscaler traffic. Data centers were looking at 4 channel 100G lanes (for an aggregate of 400Gbps) and 8 channel 50G lanes (also for an aggregate of 400Gbps) as solutions to support 400Gbps traffic. Today, this has changed substantially: market forecasts for 400G are flat if not declining, and today’s focus is on 800G using 200G lanes, with 400G and 800G lanes expected soon."
Artificial Intelligence threw a curve to manufacturers of photonic pics as well as other parts of the technology space. Manufacturing schedules were humming along with plans for next generation upgrades for modulators and suddenly plans for 400G modulators had to be bypassed as not being useful enough for the accelerating need for faster modulators as the result of AI. LWLG was facing strong competition over a year ago as it was clear that the industry could provide 400G modulators in 4 lanes using incumbent technology. It is true that LWLG had modulators that used lower power but LWLG was not ready yet with modulators that met testing requirements and it was facing residual skepticism that polymers were reliable enough, more proof was needed.
Here we are now and Lightwave's modulators could be placed in transceivers now for a 4 lane 800G solution, but transceiver companies want a modular array to get to 800G which will speed up transceiver manufacturing and likely aid reliability. Manufacturers that were banking on emerging technologies such as TFLN and BTO ran out of time as those technologies cannot offer 4 lane 800G transceivers. Modulators using InP are behind but not as much as TFLN and BTO but they are not there yet with speed to offer 4 lanes for a 800G transceiver.
So we are witnessing a real horserace here to a finish line that requires a 4 lane solution to 800G. LWLG is in the lead by far. The other next generation materials have not reached that point as yet. LWLG will be facing competition that will offer 8 lanes for a 800G transceiver. Those will sell to some extent but it will become obvious to most people that LWLG offerings will be reliable enough and much lower power and the majority of sales will go to them.. The company hasn't proven they have the manufacturing part in place to really speed ahead in sales. We have heard Michael Lebby say frequently, they cannot offer details on sales for competitive reasons. We have one announced foundry partner with others to follow this year. They are further ahead with other foundries than what has already been disclosed.
It takes a lot of time to get to the point Lightwave has done to have tested and proven 200G modulators with the characteristics the market wants. With wafer manufacturing and testing timelines between 4 and 6 months, new competing technologies are far behind. They have cycles of adjusting and testing before they perhaps will be ready with each cycle taking many months. LWLG is clearly in the lead by far in this race and that is why more companies are interested and awaiting a final transceiver product.
When I was a child, my mother was constantly reminding me to "shut those lights, you are wasting energy". Granted, she was more focused on saving money but that matters as well. Today, people are doing all sorts of things to save energy by not over consuming it. It is not just a matter of saving money but since the problems of climate change are more of a concern, people are doing things purposely to reduce the use of electric power. The immediate selling point is saving money but the objective is to lower emissions from power plants that negatively affect the atmosphere and climate.
People buy new energy efficient refrigerators even when the old ones still run fine. People upgrade to energy efficient windows for the home, and will add additional home insulation to save power. People replace old light bulbs with LEDs, use smart thermostats and lower set temperatures, buy energy efficient appliances, and go the extra mile spending for solar panels for the home.
If many people are doing these things what about data centers that will become the biggest consumers of electricity with all the new applications demanding it. They must upgrade to energy efficient equipment whenever possible. Their bottom line depends on it, their public image depends upon it and so does our climate. Modulators are a very big part of the solution to remain energy efficient at the data center level. LWLG modulators will be in great demand as they are the least expensive way to reduce significant power usage at the data center level compared to legacy modulators presently installed. If you add 3X the speed to the reduced power to run the modulators you improve efficiency even more saving additional power. It seems like a no brainer to me.
Red, that is a snarky question, so typical of you. You just keep trying to be annoying. Of course I can't answer that question with any facts. Your prejudice against a Singapore based foundry is showing even though they have the qualities that Dr. Lebby looks for with a partner.
Everyone was surprised with the announcement of Advanced Micro Foundry as a LWLG partner right before the ASM. Perhaps it might not have been such a surprise as AMF announced a March 26, 2024 update to a previous PDK that allowed for multiple product designs allowing for 200G/lane supporting 800G or 1.6T applications. We never saw the breadcrumbs leading to this one; the birds must have eaten them. Actually, I don't think the announcement of this smaller Singapore foundry garnered the buzz it deserves.
Lightwave keeps talking about only partnering with partners who a capable and trusted so AMF must have the qualities Michael Lebby is looking for. Here is the high praise he offered with the partnership
Dr. Michael Lebby, Chairman and CEO of Lightwave Logic, commented: "AMF is truly a world class facility with their
silicon photonics maturity, and capacity for volume manufacturing. Working with AMF, we not only increased our wafer
size to 200-mm, but we also turbo-boosted silicon photonics with our polymer slot modulators to achieve world class
performance. Engineers from both sides have worked hard to achieve a silicon photonics design that integrates
smoothly with polymer - a process that would have been much more challenging if other next-generation modulator
materials had been utilized. This accomplishment puts our company in a very strong position to ramp volume both for
our polymers as well as 200-mm silicon wafer volume with AMF."
It always made sense for a smaller foundry to come out first as generally speaking, smaller foundries can be more nimble in making decisions and this is supported by the fact an Asia based foundry had not been mentioned in the past and this smaller foundry accelerated quickly to be volume ready with their 200mm manufacturing.
At the ASM, Dr. Lebby stated that AMF asked to announce the partnership stating it would be good for their business.
They are young having been formed in 2017 and are needing to grow volumes. They have leading edge equipment. It is nice to have a foundry that has the right equipment and the time and space to run the work from LWLG (that probably allowed them to speed along to get to the point of having a commercialization-ready PDK in place). One would think that this now puts the pressure on the other foundries working with LWLG to move faster to complete their PDKs if necessary or announce themselves. After all, we hear customers want the modulators for 800G as soon as possible. So which foundry wants to be first with orders?
AMF specializes in silicon nitride photonics. It starts with their silicon-on-insulator platform that offers advantages as far as being to utilize a wide range of wavelengths that make it compatible for may of the current and future uses for silicon photonics. It starts with a semiconductor structure consisting of a layer of single crystalline silicon separated from the bulk substrate by a thin layer of insulator. In SOI wafers the insulator is almost invariably a thermal silicon oxide (SiO2) layer, and the substrate is a silicon wafer.
Silicon Nitride(SiN) can then be sprayed on as a film to the silicon-on-insulator platform in different methods including ALD. SiN does not transmit light itself but adds protective properties including low optical loss and thermal stability leading to better reliability. The foundry can also use SiN-on-Oxide platform another platform that is very supportive of wide frequencies and applications for telecom and datacom..
LWLG seems to be trying to cover many bases with this Asia foundry using SiN in photonics along with processes from foundries not yet named..
Singapore has been helping to fund many advanced electronic manufacturing including silicon photonics. AMF has benefited from that funding in the past.
Singapore is very business friendly, has a free trade agreement with the U.S., is on good terms with China, Taiwan, Australia, New Zealand and the U.K. (as a former colony of the U.K.). It has stayed out of the China Sea disputes and the people just seem to prosper. Average yearly income for workers in Singapore is around $70,000.00. There are over 4500 U.S. businesses registered in Singapore because it is worthwhile.
From the AMF website they describe participating in all of the current and next generation business possibilities as LWLG so there is business synergies. AMF can manufacture photonic chips supporting many wavelengths, O-band, C-band, L-band and mid-infrared. This is important as it allows them to enter emerging markets such as Lidar, sensing, and virtual reality in addition to telecom and datacom.
Importantly AMF describes being able to offer Wafer Level Packaging (WLP).
Before WLP packaging companies would receive the foundry's chip which needed final packaging and would secure the chips to the substrate( most commonly silicon) using thin wire to create the bonds. The problem that is increasingly an issue, as chips get smaller, thinner and thinner wire must be used. The result is less secure bonds that allow loss of power and lower reliability. Remember the industry wants smaller chips and LWLG can provide those so a more reliable package is optimal..
AMF can do under bump metallization (UBM) which is a packaging process that creates a thin film of metal between an integrated circuit (IC) or copper pillars and solder bumps in a flip chip package. It allows for a better electrical connection between the die and the solder bumps. Solder bumps are more reliable than the wires that are used.
AMF has other WLP techniques including laser diode attachment used frequently in photonics and single mode fiber attachment which only allows one type of light mode to propagate as opposed to multiple modes thus allowing less dispersion and faster bandwidth (just what data centers look for with data delivery over longer distances). Lower cost is part of the benefit package with WLP as opposed to traditional packaging as well as faster manufacture of a completed chip. Transceiver manufacturers would prefer to receive chips already packaged by WLP to be placed in the transceiver box.
The points I am trying to make is there are so many reasons AMF is a good partner. They have platforms that are at the cutting edge of silicon photonics. I believe Michael Lebby knows how to pick them.
"Go ahead, tell me the names of all the companies "wanting to engage with Lightwave now." From the rest of your post you ignore the technology results, the industry demand for next generation technology that bring together the believability on what he is saying.
You love to bring up the fact that Michael Lebby is not naming names and offering details in negotiations with partners and customers. In your reasoning this leads one to a conclusion that it is not happening. You are a fool to be saying this as companies, especially big companies don't conduct business negotiations in the public space .They would clearly not trust a supplier who would speak to negotiations and naming them before a contract was finalized. Until a contract is completed it may or may not be disclosed. It is very competitive in the technology space and companies do not want to give their competitors advance notice on what they are doing and planning. As a result they may request not to be named even when a contract is completed.
You continue to exhibit simplistic, black and white thinking that prevents you from adding up facts that lead to a reasonable conclusion. You are just here to discredit Michael Lebby and the company. Your consistent diatribes are meaningless as you have never shown an understanding of the technology.
Why are there suddenly so many companies wanting to engage with Lightwave now?
The answer is really very simple as it gets down to whether you can do a 4 lane 200G modulator that functions at 1V and offers advantage of speed and size over incumbent technology. It also must prove to stable and have little optical loss.
The answer of course is that LWLG is the ONLY company that is demonstrating those industry requirements NOW. Competitive technologies are not even close to offering a competitive modulator option. They are years behind and are stuck with 8 lane 100G options that aren't fast enough, consume too much power, some are way too big.
The corollary to the question is that why does it matter? The answer to that is because the industry wants it NOW. That was described in Dr. Lebby's presentation at the ASM. They are working on the preferred modulator array which as KC mentioned, samples are currently at customers for testing. More time is needed and those shareholders that hold will be rewarded. Remember it takes about six months for wafers to cycle through production.
I was at the ASM and had the same positive impressions others have described already, especially the tour of the lab facilities. All of the lab personnel showed genuine excitement on the progress that has been made and expectations for the future.
My favorite was the modulator demonstration that was at 200G and under 1V. The screen showed the data transfer through "the eyes" which were wide open all the time. It looked better than what Dr. Lebby showed on his slide in the past. They were definitely "Betty Davis Eyes".
Killer, it depends on the structure of a new organic molecule. It is possible to avoid infringement on the molecule itself if it is unique enough. I can't see how they can avoid infringement on incorporating a new polymer into foundry manufacturing based on LWLG's manufacturing patents for polymers which from my understanding includes any polymer. When you are the first one to have a way to introduce polymers into high volume manufacturing at the foundry level you get to have ownership of that process. There are different manufacturing steps that LWLG has patented so it would be very hard to bypass them.
I would say that China and South Korea experimenting with home grown polymers should not be a surprise given the limitations of other materials. Experimenting doesn't mean commercializing as we know from the LWLG journey. They have often followed the lead from U.S. and European companies on technology advancements. Their strengths have been in mass manufacture once they catch up on how to manufacture high end tech.
GP if device manufacturers use polymers from anyone other than LWLG in the manufacture of their devices, they will end up in patent court, on the hook for damages for violating LWLG, patents. What happens in China would have to stay in China (Chinese courts don't really respect patents outside of China, they make believe they do) but if sales occur elsewhere where U.S. and international patents exist liability will be there.
The question is how far ahead is LWLG in commercialization readiness? I would say, several years as they will establish themselves as the go to source for EOPs.
Nice summary proto, with silicon stretched as far as it will go there remains a need to add speed and keep power consumption as low as possible for computation and then data transmission. Heterogeneous integration will require getting smaller in order to pack more functionality into packaged devices. There is a vigorous search for new materials that can be added to the mix. Finding them and testing and developing them will take time. Polymers are here now and just waiting to be taken up. The big customers will dictate where this will go if the competition for new materials and how to use them plays out. In other words, if you build it, they will come.
Lightwave has solved the manufacturing piece at the foundry level and all that remains is the final packaging the customers wants. That should get solved in the several months at least to generate their first sale of modulators in a packaged device. LWLG is positioning itself to move into the forefront of the new generation of materials and they have the ability to enhance their polymers further to remain in contention. Once polymers are functioning in the market demand will grow because of the ease of integration these materials have in that they can be easily added to other materials in order for them to work better. A company like AMAT that has been leading semiconductor manufacturing for decades and must compete with other similar companies is certainly monitoring what is happening with LWLG polymers. They remain a candidate as a partner or acquirer as they could supply almost all the other manufacturers wanting to upgrade manufacturing in order to use polymers. Owning the material production and the PDK intellectual property will become very valuable and AMAT very likely knows this.
F2 you are clearly right about making a commitment especially since Dr. Lebby has talked about multiple foundries working on polymers so foundries know they are not the only one. This is our own version of the Kentucky Derby, someone is riding out front having committed the necessary resources and they will be rewarded first.
jeunke, you give good detail on your speculation of Samsung or Intel being the lead foundry partner. I recall Dr. Lebby saying that they have resisted demands for exclusivity with a contract. That is the beauty of engaging with multiple foundries over the past 3 years as it maintains Lightwave's independence and expands the market potential. If I think of who would press for that I think that fits Intel's history of wanting to corner a new market . As you said, they are desperate to re-energize their offerings.
It is interesting yet frustrating at the same time that we are left with speculation on who we are working with. I feel like a participant on the American TV series, The Masked Singer.
jeunke, I can see where Samsung or Intel could be the lead strategic foundry partner that is first to manufacture polymer modulators on 200nm foundry equipment. Samsung is Asia based largely although they have had a foundry in Austin Texas since 1996. I believe the map of the first 5 foundry partners didn't have a foundry in Asia but technically Samsung could qualify with its Austin location. Samsung is very comfortable with OLEDs having included them in Samsung cell phones and laptops. Intel is very big and I think it doesn't have a good reputation working with other companies in development so I am doubtful they are the lead but Intel likely has some connection with Tower and Tower is a significant player in the contract manufacturing area.. Don't forget Global Foundries, based on their early praise of polymers and their working with many companies within their Fotonix platform. That to me is a problem that they are partners with so many other companies somewhere in the manufacturing chain for transceivers. That can be problematic in that they work with possible competitors of LWLG. Can you really follow NDAs in that situation? I am not sure you can as people in the industry are always trying to figure out what everyone else is doing.
I really wonder about Skywater with 2 U.S. locations and working with 200nm processes. They are not huge like the above companies. Small motivated companies can be more focused and efficient than larger companies that have competing lines of business. Quite often the federal government stays ahead following emerging technologies that could be helpful in military operations. Skywater is a DMEA trusted (Defense Microelectronics Delivery) provider for the military and NASA as they will provide microelectronics for new advanced systems. Talk about a large entity asking their trusted foundry to work with a company like LWLG. That is possible even though data com is Lightwave's stated market they are pursuing because new military advanced electronics would likely be a tight secret. Skywater has a history of working in the photonics space. They also work in the automotive space. They could be relied upon to not inadvertently violate the NDAs. Being smaller and trying to advance in data com against competitors , they would want to remain in stealth mode in development (they are used to that).
The lead foundry likely has others following close behind. It could be to the advantage of a smaller company to try and put itself in the lead. These are my own musings of course and I could be wrong especially since the bigger market is data com and the other partner foundries likely have historically supplied big Tier 1s. Secrets, secrets, secrets. It does wear a person out especially when money is involved.
I finished watching the Safecapital presentation and overall it was quite good. Michael Lebby appeared confident and relaxed and gave us information that shows things are accelerating.
Here are some points I would highlight. The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.
The Good: I really liked his stating that LWLG's job is to displace and disrupt the incumbent semiconductors that run optical transceivers. That was a bold statement suggesting his confidence in polymers becoming ubiquitous.
He clearly stated the interest in polymer based modulators has grown quite large after the recent presentations and demonstrations at conferences to the point of the company "being dragged along" by many large companies wanting to get things going as soon as possible. He is talking several Tier-1 companies showing strong interest and what sounds like a vetting process that is required by different segments of a large Tier-1 operation before a final commitment on using the technology.
He talked about the belief that LWLG could provide upgrades when needed to 400G and even 800G modulators (which no one else can say) offering the certainty large companies want in moving to a brand new technology.
He basically laid out how LWLG modulators meet all the requirements the big corporations are looking for.
The Bad: He still could not offer any information on upcoming contracts other than the intensity both sides are working toward that goal. Shareholders have to remain patient, trust the process and keep in mind Lightwave's polymers are the best option for the market. He referred to the foundry partner available to manufacture 200G modulators in the singular so one might conclude some of the other foundries are not as far along. If that is so there still would be time enough for others to catch up as 2025 is still the large expected ramp. We still are faced with uncertainties based on stealth and NDAs. No update on the progress of the 4X 200G single chip modulator array which might be the desired package.
The Ugly: This refers to the competition which are all struggling to keep up with what LWLG has accomplished. According to Dr. Lebby incumbent technologies, Indium Phosphide, LiNiobate and silicon are "struggling" and can increase speed but at the expense of using even more power and becoming less reliable, both unacceptable options. Emerging technologies have serious limitations, TFLN is anywhere from 10-100X bigger and can't match the specs offered by Lightwave EOPs. Barium Titanate is an even bigger mess as it is very difficult to add to silicon and yields are low.
There has been a lot of money spent on trying to advance these alternative technologies but they seem to be too far behind LWLG polymers. Lightwave's progress and their failures seems to be why there are many companies coming to LWLG to partner as time is running out on placing bets on the best transceiver technology which is sorely needed for the the necessary upgrades for the data explosion that has already started. The company appears positioned for success so it is just a matter of time.
Oleblue this is very interesting from the standpoint that a major Power company is drawing a line in the sand that the cost of building out newer power generation and doing it quickly will require data centers to contribute as they will be a major driver of demand. This comes about as most power companies are bumping up against or are close to limits as there are other drivers of power usage than just data centers. Other power companies will follow.
Our country will become dependent on AI very quickly as companies build AI into their daily work systems. Having data shutdowns will have big monetary consequences for companies so they must be avoided at all costs. We have become accustomed to having power at all times and when there are slowdowns or shutdowns will get upset. Let's face it, we are spoiled. I believe raising prices for companies that use very high amounts of power makes perfect sense to help the buildout that will be needed. In fact, power companies will use AI to plan and figure out when and how to manage the costs equitably. In life, what goes around, comes around.
I suspect GP suddenly crows about selling at 15 because he wants to elevate his credibility as his credibility has been questioned for at least the three years I have read this board. With elevated credibility I think he believes his scam messages will have more of an affect.
Absolutely spartex,
"Lebby clearly said a few years ago (believe in Belgium) that plasmonics are more complicated/complex (likely means more expensive too) to make and not a good mass production product like he is working on in the Foundries"
History teaches us many things as to what one might expect in a competition of materials to become the next big thing.
Think Betamax vs VHS. Betamax produced a better visual experience. Sony was the only manufacturer as they wanted a monopoly. JVC behind VHS technology licensed it to numerous manufacturers of VCRs and tapes making it more widely available to the consumer market and less costly. It also helped that VHS tapes ran longer, better for movies.
Lightwave's polymers are easily integrated into CMOS manufacturing technologies making it theoretically available to most foundries and offer well known advantages regarding speed, power reduction and size.
Like VHS over Betamax, wider availability and lower cost was a winner. For LWLG that also will matter and on top of it all, polymers win out over competing materials for the desired next generation applications. Widespread use is inevitable.
I ran the same question 3 times on perplexity AI: Is Lightwave Logic a scam company?
I received 3 very different responses stating uncertainty as a conclusion, not probably a scam.
None of the searches gives clickable weblinks which you placed yourself. Sources were cited which you could open up and read. They varied as well.
So you were trying to prove the company is a scam but the end result was uncertainty looking at the text of the 3 runs I did.
It mainly proves Perplexity AI is very sloppy and inconsistent and you will go to great lengths to come up with nonsense to put the company down.
GP, Thanks for citing my post from last May in your effort to prove LWLG is a scam. If you read it carefully you would have seen that it stated the opposite. This shows that you are not careful in what you read or do not understand it.
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=171962603
Not vomit-blather Steven. Shareholders who have followed Dr. Lebby's statements over the past few years have experienced him being very sure of the success of EOPs entering the market in the future. What to me is different is that he has announced completion of integration into foundry PDKs for high volume manufacturing, solving wafer poling, reporting excellent stability far beyond minimum standards with low optical loss and stated they can sell 200G modulators now that could be placed in transceivers. He is clearly more certain than he has been in past years. That all adds up to being very, very close to have things roll. In addition, he is talking multiple significant milestones in a tight time frame being the rest of 2024. He is now putting his reputation on the line for real commercialization in 2024.
Ted, you have this stalking-like behavior where you seem to be baiting me to argue with you about when Dr. Lebby has said commercialization would begin in earnest. Luckily I have you on ignore so I haven't seen most of those posts. I still maintain he has suggested that a commercialization ramp of LWLG transceivers with their foundry produced modulators was to start in 2024. At the ASM in 2022 he had a slide showing yearly goals starting in 2021 with incremental milestones leading to 2024 showing customer acceptance and ramp. In 2021 he noted the company was still in the prototyping stage, in 2022 the piloting stage in 2023 solidly in the manufacturing stage where PDKs would be finalized. It was clear further steps were needed to get the company ready to sell products. He has suggested a deal with a foundry partner could happen along the way before but the need to keep foundry partner information under NDAs has been stated as to why it has not happened yet. I know, you don't believe NDAs are real things but they are widely used in the technology space. You keep saying he "promised" deals in years past. You cannot seem to differentiate working goals for upcoming years as immediate goals. This is how you spread your propaganda and you do it over and over.
Your obvious role here is to be a spoiler spreading propaganda most likely for your employer. From my experience with any dialogue with you it could go back and forth if I let it but I have seen it only gives you more of a platform to spread your conspiracy theories about Michael Lebby and to deride positive posts from shareholders. You are best kept on ignore as far as I am concerned. I know others have already done so. You seem more desperate to get people to dialogue and debate with you around your inflammatory statements of "facts" often taken out of context from what Dr. Lebby might say. It is no surprise you are being ignored by many.
Recently the EPA issued a new regulation affecting coal fired power plants and new gas powered plants to reduce carbon emissions by 90% by 2032. In order to do so, they can choose the method such as using carbon capture in wells, or using renewable energy sources. For coal fired plants converting equipment to use gas or building out a carbon capture solution could run into a billion dollars or more. In addition, they are expected to control emitting mercury and arsenic into the air and stop dumping coal ash into landfills. They will not be allowed to dump waste water from the plant any longer by 2032. Coal powered electric utilities accounted for 16% of the energy used n the U.S. this past year. This is a bridge too far for coal fired plants as they will continue to shut down over the next several years so this becomes a problem for our already stretched electric grid system.
Timing is not good as electrification of all kinds continues and data center use of electricity is expected to grow greatly in the coming years. In Europe there are regulations in place that data centers must be carbon neutral by 2030 which entails use of renewable energy. Data centers are working toward that aggressively now in Europe. There are no regulations in the U.S. for data centers to control energy use or to be carbon negative. Google has set an example and has been carbon negative for several years and Microsoft is aggressively moving in that direction. They are the forward thinkers.
Data centers see the writing on the wall and realize if they don't aggressively reduce power consumption and the associated emitting of CO2 coming from the making of that power they will be made to comply in the not too distant future through federal and state regulations. They do not want government trying to control their business. Data centers will look for any way to reduce power and to move towards carbon neutrality with the source of power used.
This of course is good for LWLG that it is the best available green technology for modulators. Could new regulations be driving some of the urgency described by other posters? To some extent perhaps as the hyper scalers knew it was coming. I think the green light that LWLG has high volume wafer manufacturing and poling solved and the 800G modulator is ready to buy has more to do with it. There will be challenges to the new regulations but the pressure to reduce CO2 emissions will continue . At the end of the day it is best to be the greenest solution available for the data centers for reducing overall power usage..
Having technology that is proprietary and that has the potential to be a dominant force in its market can enrich its shareholders if it succeeds in its development. On the other hand it creates uncertainty about its success as it remains in a lengthy period of development which is typical for truly unique technology. The longer it takes to develop, the more rocks get thrown at it by the people who wish it does not succeed. As we have seen here there has been accusations of lies, deceit , doubt, financial blunders and tales of failures with the technology along with other conspiracy theories that are meant to keep up skepticism even in the face of incremental success that has put the company in position to start commercialization.
It is true our patent moat will be a huge benefit as LWLG commercializes however being proprietary results in greater scrutiny by customers to make sure they should embrace polymers for next generation transceivers. This leads to more questions the company must answer before customers will commit to purchase those transceivers. Making the commitment to do so is a big deal for a Tier 1 company and its plan for upgrades. Questions must be answered to the satisfaction of the customer if a big commitment is to be made especially when the deal is with a small company with completely new technology that is proprietary and relies on other companies for manufacturing.
Stability and reliability testing must get done more than usual as it is such a new technology. That means more production runs and testing of samples than would occur with a more familiar technology. Customers would want to know how many foundries can run volumes of the needed wafers and will they have the space for large contracts when requested (after all there won't be other companies to turn to for polymer based EOPs.). Is the second manufacturing site for the polymers ready? What is the status of the transceiver partner or partners for volume packaging. Concerns regarding competition with other customers for the volumes that could be requested when the expected ramp occurs in 2025 (and maybe sooner) especially if there is any questions on foundry space. A big customer would want reassurances on financials present and future. There would be questions on who is responsible for critical points in leadership or manufacturing so there is coverage if a lead individual could no longer work his or her role. Hopefully, questions on pricing has already been agreed upon but last minute adjustments in the wording of a contract is common enough when the legal department puts the language under the microscope.
All of these questions and more are responded to by Dr. Lebby and others in the vetting process and the answers go up to different levels in the corporate structure of a Tier 1 company for approval. THIS ALL TAKES TIME. I think a lot has been agreed upon or if adjustments are required they can be fixed in the near term otherwise and that is why Dr. Lebby has been so confident. There certainly could be MOUs in place that establish contracts gets finalized when certain things get final approval. ALL of the doubts by the Bashers have continued because an official announcement of deal has not been made as yet. I think a big deal is coming anytime in the next couple months.
Data centers have for the most part abandoned their plans for upgrading their transceivers to 400G and are now focused more on 800G. What effect did that have on development of legacy products before it became apparent. There has been some scrambling by legacy transceiver manufacturers to catch up to that reality. They have the option of doubling the number of modulators available to them but that will not meet growing demands for lower power.
According to transceiver maker FS looking at 400G vs 800G, As the module speed increases, the power consumption becomes higher, and the cost will also increase. The 800G module has high transmission rate and high power consumption, and requires more powerful heat dissipation and power supply system support.
Using legacy technology solves the speed currently being requested by data centers but more power will be consumed and additional power and cost comes into the heat mitigation as the closer modulators are packed into a small space, the harder it becomes to cool equipment to maintain effectiveness over time. This seems like an untenable solution.
There is a lot of talk about TFLN and InP modulators coming to the rescue but they both have more questions than answers. Only LWLG EOPs meets the demands for small size, lower power, and speed while decreasing the cost of operation and providing both next generation upgrade potential and safe harbor sourcing from a U.S. based company. LWLG is just common sense, by design.
Arista staying with their development plans for LPO and LRO speaks to their confidence (likely over confidence) in their technology and more importantly, the time and effort having been spent so far in that development. Developing new advancements in technology takes a lot of time (don't we know it). Once into that development plan, it is hard to abandon it prematurely. It sounds like they want to play out their hand and see how it can stack up. They are playing it safe I suppose. If their plan doesn't work out over the next year or two they can become a customer once EOPs prove themselves in the initial market launch.
It takes a company or companies to not be wedded to their past successes and to have done their homework, to take a chance on really new technology like EOPs. The race for market share will be heating up as 2024 progresses.
tkg I believe a 25% data consumption usage is absolutely unattainable as restrictions on data center upgrades would ensue. Our power grid system could not handle that and there would be regulatory pushbacks.
The U.S. power grid is not in good shape. Most of the U.S. power grid system was built in the 1960s and 1970s and currently 70 percent of transmission lines are over 25 years old, getting close to needing replacement. The system is approaching the end of its typical 50–80-year lifecycle. It takes anywhere from 5-15 years to plan, get approval for permits and build out new, more power infrastructure. This process would get speeded up if doing so became more of an urgency but considering the age of our power transmission system, it couldn't happen by 2030.
What this means is that data centers MUST solve a big portion of the power consumption problem and get on the ball sooner than later. Using LWLG technology and Linear-drive Pluggable Optics are both being looked at as options to lower power consumption. For data centers, lowering power is important but functionality will also drive the the choices and we have to wait to see how each technology gets developed.
Agree on this jeunke:
"These big customers want the future now, outsmart the competition,, lower cost of ownership, current organizational capabilities, no capital investments, no write offs. I think they gladly pay billions of dollars to secure the future of their enterprise and for ' peace of mind and guaranteed bonus pay outs".
They also want guarantee of product, volume of the needed product when requested as well as a cost they can accept. This is evident based on requests for second material production site for polymers and LWLG dealing with queries on exclusivity. One only has to look at the pressure that has been bought to bear on TSMC to expand facilities outside Taiwan and to Arizona. Also, consider the supply chain problems that arose from suppliers in Asia not being able to supply a component needed to complete manufacture of electronics, appliances and even cars. Having reliable product production in the U.S. and strongly aligned European sites becomes very important with lessons learned during and in the aftermath of the pandemic. Add in the growing world tensions raising supply chain uncertainties, Dr. Lebby's emphasis on keeping adequate material and semiconductor manufacturing in safe locations appears very desirable.
theroc, I like the idea of things playing out with multiple joint ventures. A company like Nvidia benefits as long as a robust and very fast internet evolves; more GPU sales would be the outcome. If a company that was a direct competitor or one that would limit access to polymers to other companies or even if LWLG didn't move things fast enough, Nvidia would try and make a play for the company to control the availability.
Unless you integrate chart information with a deep knowledge of a company as well as knowing where the market is at any given point, then you have a chance to know the direction of a stock's price. Charts don't consider news that comes out about a company and other companies as a whole which will obviously affect things.
Charting by itself in the hands of people who don't consider the above is just a bunch of Hocus Pocus to try and influence others.
March 11, 2019 Nvidia purchased Mellanox for 6.9 billion dollars in order to expand its business further, beyond servers into the transmission system of the internet. Jensen Huang saw Mellanox and its strong software support of its networking equipment as a way of extending Nvidia reach creating an end to end systems company.
From March 14, 2019 explaining the move he said:
"We believe that in future datacenters, the compute will not start and end at the server, but the compute will extend into the network. And the network itself, the fabric, will become part of the computing fabric. Long-term, I think we have the opportunity to create datacenter-scale computing architectures; short-term, Mellanox’s footprint in datacenters is quite large. […] We will be in position to address this large market opportunity much better,” he said.
He went on to say:
]“We were a GPU company and then we became a GPU systems company. We became a computing company which started from the chip up, now we are extending ourselves into a datacenter computing company,” he said.
I can see that Nvidia clearly wants to control the delivery system which can support the much more valuable chip business for servers in the AI future. You can't sell new GPUs to stay ahead of the competition unless there is a delivery system to support the the need for new, more advanced servers. He wants control of it all (also keeping Intel at bay).
LWLG would be an additive component for anyone wanting to have control over increasing the speed of data transmission over the next decade. Our company must first prove itself in the marketplace. It is early but a bidding war seems very likely at some point in the next few years.
https://www.hpcwire.com/2019/03/14/why-nvidia-bought-mellanox-future-datacenters-will-belike-high-performance-computers/
"the glisterning in their eyes". DOA, I took that to mean some real positive emotion along with the words which makes what is said more believable.
According to this market analysis Google is in the lead of trying to upgrade to 800G transmission compare to other data center companies. The race has started and others will follow.
https://community.fs.com/article/800g-optical-transceiver-market-analysis.html