LUMM NEWS!:
Wednesday May 17, 10:31 am Eastern Time
Company Press Release
Lumenon's PHASIC--TM-- Process Successfully Implemented
Company's Ramp-Up To Volume Manufacturing
Highlights of Recent Activities and Current Growth Plans
Lumenon Innovative Lightwave Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ NM: LUMM - news), announced today that its proprietary PHASIC(TM)process has been successfully implemented within its pilot plant.
PHASIC(TM) is Lumenon's end-to-end optical chip process that integrates design, fabrication, packaging and testing of planar lightwave circuit components.
Underlying PHASIC(TM) are Lumenon's nimble design tools, custom hybrid glasses and unique packaging solutions that in combination allows the Company to offer tailored-off-the-shelf products to its customers. This positions Lumenon to supply, as early as next year, large volume solutions to customer requirements.
``With the implementation of the PHASIC(TM) process in our pilot plant, Lumenon is now poised to fulfill its mission to sell a broad range of integrated optics components into the telecommunication and data communication markets. The near-term completion of the Company's new 42,000 square foot
manufacturing facility will inaugurate PHASIC(TM) as a true high volume production process,'' stated Dr. Mark Andrews, Chief Technology Officer of Lumenon.
``Volume manufacturing is the raison d'etre of Lumenon,'' commented Dr. Iraj Najafi, President and Chief Executive Officer. ``Accordingly, our focus has now turned to scaling up our commercial operations.''
Lumenon currently offers small form factor arrayed waveguide WWDM / DWDM optical chips for 1.3-micrometer and 1.55-micrometer applications. The 1.55-micrometer products are offered in 8, 16, 32 and 40 channel configurations at 100 GHz channel spacing. Higher channel count devices as
well as 50 GHz and 25 GHz channel spacing options are under development.
In response to requests received at the Optical Fiber Conference (OFC) held in March 2000 in Baltimore, Maryland, Lumenon designed and prototyped a series of 1.3-micrometer WWDM and DWDM components. The Company is now ready to accept orders for these products.
``One of our main competitive advantages is our ability to react rapidly with a full range of passive photonic devices. In fact, our 1.3-micrometer offering was developed in less that one month showing how the Company can meet customer requests quickly and effectively. We believe that this agility will be significant in Lumenon's future,'' stated Mr. Philip Meffe, Vice-President of Business Development.
Manufacturing
PHASIC(TM) builds on the successful manufacturing paradigm established by the semiconductor industry -- but without the complexity and expense. The Company's manufacturing platform was proved at its pilot plant in Dorval, Canada. Concurrent engineering between R&D and manufacturing at this site has accelerated time to market.
The pilot plant will remain part of the Company's ramp-up strategy until its volume manufacturing facility becomes operational. The pilot plant will then focus on engineering new products and process development as well as providing capacity for low volume manufacturing for highly specialized
product requirements. The COO, Dr. Chia-Yen Li comments that, ``The knowledge and experience we acquired from this facility on a product and a process perspective has been a critical contributor in the design of our new facility.''
The Company reports that construction of a new facility is on schedule. Lumenon has scheduled occupation of its offices in July 2000. Laboratories, microfabrication, packaging and test areas will be constructed within the facility over the summer. The projected completion date is September 2000 and limited production is planned for the fourth calendar quarter, leading to volume production in early 2001. The facility will produce wafer level components and fully packaged products.
Vincent Belanger, the Company's CFO, commented that, ``Although our manufacturing plant is designed to have a capacity of 500 fully packaged devices a day, we have the possibility to package our surplus chip capacity through partnerships which can be extended to third parties.''
The Road Ahead
Lumenon intends to extend its passive component portfolio to support a full range of telecommunication and data communication devices over the next 12 months. These products are planned to include splitters, couplers, filters, interferometers, add/drops, and combinations of these.
In the future Lumenon intends to use PHASIC(TM) to leverage its position in the production of hybrid opto-electronic circuits that combine PLCs and ICs on the same platform. ``Application specific devices are viewed as critical enablers for high-speed access as end-user bandwidth demand
continues to increase,'' stated Dr. Andrews.
Financial
Lumenon's financial statements for the quarter ended March 31, 2000 were filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on May 15, 2000. Lumenon continues to meet its financial projections and its rapid expansion remains on schedule. Lumenon anticipates posting revenues during the quarter ending September 30, 2000 through initial low volume sales as it seeds the market place from its pilot plant.
Team
``Lumenon has been very successful in managing the growth of the Company both in acquiring excellent people and integrating them into a solid team,'' commented Reginald Ross, Lumenon's Vice President of Corporate Development. ``Growing from 25 at the beginning of this year to our current strength of 50 has been an interesting challenge. We are looking forward to growing to over 100 by this summer, 150 by the end of the year and over 200 in 2001.''
To build the team necessary to accomplish its mission Lumenon has implemented a four-phase program:
- Phase-1 has focused on building the skill set and organization to commercialize the PHASIC(TM) process. The success in this phase has been instrumental in providing the credibility to attract the calibre of executives and staff required to build the organization.
- Phase-2 involved building a strong management team composed of key executives in manufacturing, marketing and sales, and applications engineering. The executives selected were all active players in the industry drawn from both Canada and the U.S. This management team has been augmented by a cadre of specialists in human resources, finance, manufacturing and administration providing a strong basis from which to continue growth.
- Phase-3 will focus on ramping up for volume manufacturing and Lumenon intends to recruit additional production and technical staff required to operate our new plant. Lumenon is leveraging its relationship with North American and European universities to fill specialized positions and meet its staffing requirements.
- Phase-4 will involve taking the plant from a
500-packaged-device-per-day capacity to 1,000
packaged-device-per-day along with the attendant support and
infrastructure personnel.
About Lumenon Innovative Lightwave Technology, Inc.:
Lumenon Innovative Lightwave Technology, Inc. designs, develops and builds integrated optics devices in the form of compact hybrid glass circuits on silicon chips. The chips can dramatically boost bandwidth in fiber optic cabling, the pipeline for today's burgeoning telecommunication and data
communication industries. Lumenon's breakthrough Hybrid Sol-Gel Glass technology offers telecommunications providers the ability to vastly increase their Bandwidth capacity at a fraction of the cost of conventional dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) equipment.
For more information about Lumenon Innovative Lightwave Technology, Inc., contact Steve Litwin, Investor Relations, tel. 1-514-331-3738, fax 1-514-331-1272 and visit the Company's web site at lumenon.com.
This press release contains certain ``forward-looking'' statements, as defined in the United States
Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, that involve a number of risks and uncertainties.
There can be no assurance that such statements will prove to be accurate and the actual results and
future events could differ materially from management's current expectations. Such factors are
detailed from time to time in the Company's filings with the regulatory authorities having jurisdiction.
Contact:
Lumenon Innovative Lightwave Technology, Inc.
Steve Litwin
Investor Relations
514/331-3738
514/331-1272 (fax)
www.lumenon.com. |
