teddybear said, They said many NDA's and that probably was true - at OFC last year they demonstrated their tech and probably had everyone they invited sign an NDA.
congratulations! doesn't it feel good to tell the truth for once!! Oh, and don't forget they had teams of scientists and engineers coming out to LWLG CO Labs as follow ups to those NDA's, the 200Gbs modulator on 200mm Wafers was the highlight of OFC 2024!!
When too great of success bites you in the ass, a short case study
December 2023 developments and IP building but still no success with scaling on to large 200mm Wafers achieved, Lebby working several Tier 2 deals that would not require the mass production of large Wafers
March 2024 Lebby at OFC demo's 200gbs modulators produced on 200mm Wafers with world class performance metrics and is overwhelmed by Tier 1 interest in LWLG's technology now, there are a dozen or more Tier 1 NDA's signed, and some even begin sending teams out to LWLG's CO labs to further investigate things, Lebby tells investors he is now not just being pulled along, but dragged along to get things done even faster, Lebby tells investors he had to pick and choose the "friendly's" from amongst all the Tier 1's trying to get his attention!! Sounds like a good problem to have right? but is it really?
Lebby turns his attention away from the Tier 2 deals he was going to be closing deals with in 2024 to devote his attention to the Tier 1's he has hand chosen now, saying to investors "what would you rather have, 10 small deals or 1 giant deal"? so Lebby believes his small devices team can handle to builds of what Lebby described as "deepening relationships" with some of the largest Transceiver makers in the world on 3 continents, by the time of the ASM in May 2024 Lebby shows Slide #29 (color coded) showing PkM-6 and the 4x200 PIC were "In Qualifications" and by fall 2024 LWLG won the Optical Integration Award at ECOC (for "Ease of Integration") for the second straight year!! Everything is looking like it's coming up roses, but by late 2024 Lebby declares he "needs a little more time" as apparently his small LWLG in-house devices team could not get to a successful completion of their custom 4x200 PIC device builds and get a deal inked before 2024 would end as the long-standing Timeline Lebby set out at least as far back as 2019 called for this Tier 1 Customer Acceptance in 2024
Lebby having such great success early in 2024 was also the cause of the following
1) Lebby switching horses mid-stream and not closing the Tier 2 deals he had been focused on before the OFC success with Tier 1's
2) Lebby "picking & choosing" what he called his "friendly's" from the long list of interested Tier 1's because of his limited in-house resources, ie devices team,
a) this had the effect of NOT servicing MANY interested Tier 1's which wasn't a good thing b) being under staffed in-house caused slower progress on those "friendly's" than could have been had with their larger device teams, after all THIS IS WHAT THEY DO!!! c) LWLG working on Tier 1 custom PICs was causing those Tier 1's to see LWLG as possibly a Competitor as well as a Supplier
The change in Business Strategy opens the door now to ALL the interested Tier 1's and allows LWLG to focus on the Material Systems, this is the life blood of the Industry quest to begin with, and it is worth an absolute TON, there are MANY MANY applications, see this post of mine for a complete explanation