$LWLG Recent Significant Events and Milestones Achieved (from Q)
In December 2016, we achieved high-speed modulation in our first all-organic polymer ridge waveguide intensity modulator prototype, which constituted one of the most significant moments in the history of our Company. Our initial "alpha" prototype device, enabled by our P 2 IC™ polymer system, demonstrated bandwidth suitable for data rates up to about 10 Gbps. This performance exceeds the telecom OC-48 standard (2.5 Gbps). This device demonstrated true amplitude (intensity) modulation in a Mach-Zehnder modulator structure incorporating our polymer waveguides.
In April 2017 we achieved bandwidth suitable for 25Gbps data rates in an all-organic polymer ridge waveguide intensity modulator prototype, a significant improvement over our initial 10Gbps device modulator prototype. This breakthrough was significant because a 25Gbps data rate is important to the optical networking industry because this data rate is a major node to achieve 100 Gbps (using 4 channels of 25 Gbps). In July 2017 we advanced our high-speed modulation performance to satisfy 28Gbps data rates for QSFP28 standards and 100Gbps data center applications.
In September 2017 we achieved outstanding performance of our ridge waveguide Mach-Zehnder modulators ahead of schedule, with bandwidth performance levels that will enable 50Gbps modulation in fiber-optic communications. This important achievement will allow users to utilize arrays of 4 x 50Gbps polymer modulators using PAM-4 encoding to access 400Gbps data rate systems. Pulse-Amplitude Modulation (PAM-4) is an encoding scheme that can double the amount of data that can be transmitted.
During February and March 2018, we moved our Newark, Delaware synthetic laboratory and our Longmont, Colorado optical testing laboratory and corporate headquarters to our new office, laboratory and research and development space located at 369 Inverness Parkway, Suite 350, Englewood, Colorado. The new 13,420 square feet Englewood facility includes fully functional 1,000 square feet of class 1,000 cleanroom, 500 square feet of class 10,000 cleanroom, chemistry laboratories, and analytic laboratories. The new Englewood facility streamlines all of our Company’s research and development workflow for greater operational efficiencies.
During March 2018, our Company, together with our packaging partner, successfully demonstrated packaged polymer modulators designed for 50Gbps, which we believe will allow us to scale our P 2 IC™ platform with our Mach-Zehnder ridge waveguide modulator design as well as other photonics devices competitively in the 100Gbps and 400Gbps datacom and telecommunications applications market. We are currently fine-tuning the performance parameters of these prototypes in preparation for customer evaluations. Polymer modulators that operate both at 25Gbps and 50Gbps are expected to be attractive to customers for characterization as the 25Gbps data rate is critical for the 100Gbps data communications and telecommunications market while the 50Gbps data rate allows the ability to address the 400Gbps and 800Gbps systems with a high-performance, cost-effective solution. The datacom and telecommunications application markets represent a market opportunity for our PIC-based technologies with fiber-based transceivers that in total is forecasted to grow to over $25B by 2025.
During June 2018, our Company Acquired the Polymer Technology Intellectual Property Assets of BrPhotonics Productos Optoelectrónicos S.A., a Brazilian corporation, which significantly advanced our patent portfolio of electro-optic polymer technology with 15 polymer chemistry materials, devices, packaging and subsystems patent and further strengthened our design capabilities to solidify our market position as we prepare to enter the 400Gbps integrated photonics marketplace with a highly competitive, scalable alternative to installed legacy systems.
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Also, during June 2018, our Company promoted polymer PICs and Solidified Polymer PICs as Part of the Photonics Roadmap at the World Technology Mapping Forum in Enschede, Netherlands, which includes our Company’s technology of polymers and polymer PICs that have the potential to drive not only 400Gbps aggregate data rate solutions, but also 800Gbps and beyond.
As we move forward through 2018, we expect to continue building our world-class design team for both polymer materials and integrated photonics technology platform to further optimize our P 2 IC™ platform. With the now consolidated facility in Englewood, Colorado, we can keep key technologies and processes internal to the Company. We have completed our upgrade of our Englewood facility in areas of test, characterization, fabrication, and chemistry. We will package our modulators for customer evaluation and will continue to design our polymers for improved data rates and lower power operation. We will engage with customers to fine tune our technology to meet customer expectations, and we will scale our technology to provide cost effective technological solutions for the fiber communications market segments. We intend to partner with other companies as necessary, e.g. our packaging partner, to enable us to move quickly towards customer prototypes.
In December 2016, we achieved high-speed modulation in our first all-organic polymer ridge waveguide intensity modulator prototype, which constituted one of the most significant moments in the history of our Company. Our initial "alpha" prototype device, enabled by our P 2 IC™ polymer system, demonstrated bandwidth suitable for data rates up to about 10 Gbps. This performance exceeds the telecom OC-48 standard (2.5 Gbps). This device demonstrated true amplitude (intensity) modulation in a Mach-Zehnder modulator structure incorporating our polymer waveguides.
In April 2017 we achieved bandwidth suitable for 25Gbps data rates in an all-organic polymer ridge waveguide intensity modulator prototype, a significant improvement over our initial 10Gbps device modulator prototype. This breakthrough was significant because a 25Gbps data rate is important to the optical networking industry because this data rate is a major node to achieve 100 Gbps (using 4 channels of 25 Gbps). In July 2017 we advanced our high-speed modulation performance to satisfy 28Gbps data rates for QSFP28 standards and 100Gbps data center applications.
In September 2017 we achieved outstanding performance of our ridge waveguide Mach-Zehnder modulators ahead of schedule, with bandwidth performance levels that will enable 50Gbps modulation in fiber-optic communications. This important achievement will allow users to utilize arrays of 4 x 50Gbps polymer modulators using PAM-4 encoding to access 400Gbps data rate systems. Pulse-Amplitude Modulation (PAM-4) is an encoding scheme that can double the amount of data that can be transmitted.
During February and March 2018, we moved our Newark, Delaware synthetic laboratory and our Longmont, Colorado optical testing laboratory and corporate headquarters to our new office, laboratory and research and development space located at 369 Inverness Parkway, Suite 350, Englewood, Colorado. The new 13,420 square feet Englewood facility includes fully functional 1,000 square feet of class 1,000 cleanroom, 500 square feet of class 10,000 cleanroom, chemistry laboratories, and analytic laboratories. The new Englewood facility streamlines all of our Company’s research and development workflow for greater operational efficiencies.
During March 2018, our Company, together with our packaging partner, successfully demonstrated packaged polymer modulators designed for 50Gbps, which we believe will allow us to scale our P 2 IC™ platform with our Mach-Zehnder ridge waveguide modulator design as well as other photonics devices competitively in the 100Gbps and 400Gbps datacom and telecommunications applications market. We are currently fine-tuning the performance parameters of these prototypes in preparation for customer evaluations. Polymer modulators that operate both at 25Gbps and 50Gbps are expected to be attractive to customers for characterization as the 25Gbps data rate is critical for the 100Gbps data communications and telecommunications market while the 50Gbps data rate allows the ability to address the 400Gbps and 800Gbps systems with a high-performance, cost-effective solution. The datacom and telecommunications application markets represent a market opportunity for our PIC-based technologies with fiber-based transceivers that in total is forecasted to grow to over $25B by 2025.
During June 2018, our Company Acquired the Polymer Technology Intellectual Property Assets of BrPhotonics Productos Optoelectrónicos S.A., a Brazilian corporation, which significantly advanced our patent portfolio of electro-optic polymer technology with 15 polymer chemistry materials, devices, packaging and subsystems patent and further strengthened our design capabilities to solidify our market position as we prepare to enter the 400Gbps integrated photonics marketplace with a highly competitive, scalable alternative to installed legacy systems.
18
Also, during June 2018, our Company promoted polymer PICs and Solidified Polymer PICs as Part of the Photonics Roadmap at the World Technology Mapping Forum in Enschede, Netherlands, which includes our Company’s technology of polymers and polymer PICs that have the potential to drive not only 400Gbps aggregate data rate solutions, but also 800Gbps and beyond.
As we move forward through 2018, we expect to continue building our world-class design team for both polymer materials and integrated photonics technology platform to further optimize our P 2 IC™ platform. With the now consolidated facility in Englewood, Colorado, we can keep key technologies and processes internal to the Company. We have completed our upgrade of our Englewood facility in areas of test, characterization, fabrication, and chemistry. We will package our modulators for customer evaluation and will continue to design our polymers for improved data rates and lower power operation. We will engage with customers to fine tune our technology to meet customer expectations, and we will scale our technology to provide cost effective technological solutions for the fiber communications market segments. We intend to partner with other companies as necessary, e.g. our packaging partner, to enable us to move quickly towards customer prototypes.
$MJ
