July 6, 2005 San Jose, CA -- NeoPhotonics today announced the completion of its merger with Photon Technology of Shenzhen, China. According to a press release, the new company, called NeoPhotonics, expects revenues to exceed $50 million in 2005, has more than 1200 employees (primarily in China and the U.S.), and has more than 100 customers, many of which are tier one network equipment suppliers.
Photon Technology, one of China's largest active component manufacturers, was founded in 1993. According to NeoPhotonics, a developer of integrated component solutions using planar lightwave circuits (PLC), the merger creates a company with one of the industries' broadest and deepest optical component capabilities. The company says its advanced platforms combine active and passive components into products and modules for long-haul, metro, and access optical networks.
"The merged company is a 'one stop shop' for optical components, with a complete line of active and passive modules from the core to the edge of the network, and a particularly strong product portfolio for the booming FTTP sector," comments Tim Jenks, chairman and CEO of NeoPhotonics. "With our commitment to quality, our technology, cost structure, operational efficiency, and our customer focus, we believe that we will rapidly become one of the top manufacturers of optical network components."
The company says it now has the technology to achieve and rapidly deploy devices for "photonic integration," also known as optical "system-on-a-chip" technology. According to the company, photonic integration will create deployment and operational efficiencies throughout networks, and has the potential to lower costs and result in faster deployment of new services.
The merged companies say they combine next-generation PLC technology with high volume laser and transceiver manufacturing capability. According to NeoPhotonics, its key market opportunities now include the integration of active lasers with passive filtering and alignment on PLC substrates for low cost triplexers used in triple play FTTP access networks, as well as transceiver modules for reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexers (ROADMs) used in metro and long-haul networks.
"We have a strong and rapidly growing international presence that will be significantly enhanced in sales and engineering presence and capability through this merger," comments Zhangyong Huang, former president and CEO of Photon Technology, and president of the new company's China operations. "As a result, we will better serve customers, while enhancing our quality, engineering, and product performance."
NeoPhotonics says it will establish global headquarters in San Jose, California. The company will maintain principal manufacturing facilities in Shenzhen, with research and development facilities located there, in Beijing, and in San Jose. Sales offices will be located in China, the U.S., and Europe, as well as in other global locations.
Zhangyong Huang has been elected vice-chairman of the board of NeoPhotonics. In addition to Mr. Huang, Robert Peng and Steve Xu have joined the board of the new company, succeeding directors Ken Westrick and Maurice Gunderson.
The Hina Group acted as exclusive financial advisor to NeoPhotonics in the overall transaction.