AXT (NASDAQ:AXTI) Q2 2026 Earnings Call

0:00 Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to AXT's Second Quarter twenty twenty six Financial Conference Call. Leading the call today is Doctor. Morris Young, Chief Executive Officer and Gary Fisher, Chief Financial Officer. In addition, Tim Bettles, VP of Business Development, will be participating in the Q and A portion of the call. My name is Kenneth, and I will be your coordinator today. I would now like to turn the call over to Leslie Green, Investor Relations for AXT.

0:44 Thank you, Kenneth, and good afternoon, everyone. Before we begin, I would like to remind you that during the course of this conference call, including comments made in response to your questions, we will provide projections or make other forward looking statements regarding, among other things, the future financial performance of the company, market conditions and trends, emerging applications using chips or devices fabricated on our substrates, our product mix global economic and political conditions, including trade tariffs and import and export restrictions ability to obtain China export permits timing of receipt of export permits list our subsidiary, Tongmei, in Hong Kong our ability to increase orders in succeeding quarters to control costs and expenses to improve manufacturing yields and efficiencies or to utilize our manufacturing capacity.

1:40 We wish to caution you that such statements deal with future events, are based on management's current expectations and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual events and results to differ materially. In addition to the matters just listed, these uncertainties and risks include, but are not limited to, the financial performance of our partially owned supply chain companies and increased environmental regulations in China.

2:07 In addition to the factors just mentioned that may be discussed on this call, we refer you to the company's periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. These are available online by link from our website and contain additional information on risk factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from our current expectations. This conference call will be available on our website at axt.com through 07/30/2027. Also, want to note that shortly following the close of the market today, we issued a press release reporting financial results for the second quarter of twenty twenty six. This information is available on the Investor Relations portion of our website. I would now like to turn the call over to Gary Fisher for a review of our second quarter twenty twenty six results. Gary?

2:58 Thank you, Leslie, and good afternoon to everyone. Our Q2 financial results highlight an exciting inflection in our business trajectory and the beginnings of a multiyear growth phase for AXT. Revenue for the second quarter of twenty twenty six is $47,600,000 This is the highest quarterly revenue in AXT's history, up nearly 77% from $26,900,000 in the first quarter and up 164% from $18,000,000 in the second quarter of twenty twenty five. To break down our Q2 twenty twenty six revenue for you by product category, indium phosphide was $30,700,000 also the highest in our company's history. Let me repeat that. Indium phosphide was 30,700,000 also the highest in our company's history, primarily from data center applications.

3:52 Gallium arsenide was $6,600,000 germanium substrates were 2 and $72,000 Finally, revenue from our consolidated raw material joint venture companies in Q2 was $10,000,000 The top five customers generated approximately 30% of total revenue and no customers are over the 10% level. Gross margin showed a substantial improvement again in the second quarter, primarily driven by an increase in total volume and a favorable product mix. Non GAAP gross margin was 45.0% compared with 29.9% gross margin in Q1 of twenty twenty six and eight point two percent gross margin in Q2 of twenty twenty five. For those who prefer to track results on a GAAP basis, gross margin in the second quarter was 44.9% compared with 29.6% in Q1 and 8.0% in Q2 of twenty twenty five.

4:50 This is a huge, huge positive change from Q1 of twenty twenty five. Moving to operating expenses. Our total non GAAP operating expense in Q2 was CAD 10,200,000 compared with $8,600,000 in Q1 and $7,600,000 in Q2 of twenty twenty five. On a GAAP basis, total operating expense was in Q2 was $10,900,000 compared with 9,600,000 in Q1 and eight point two million in Q2 of last year. Our non GAAP operating profit for the second quarter of twenty twenty six is $11,200,000 compared with a non GAAP operating loss in Q1 of $550,000 and a non GAAP operating loss of $6,100,000 in Q2 of twenty twenty five.

5:39 For reference, our GAAP operating line for the second quarter of twenty twenty six was Kenneth?

6:24 Hello, Alyssa. You disappeared. Can you back now. Okay. Great. Terrific. Continue, Gary. Am I just on the speaker on the cell phone now? Can can you hear me okay? Loud and clear. You can continue. Okay. For the benefit of people listening, it's afternoon where you are. We're in China right now and we're at the conference room of the Tongmei headquarters. So we have a little bit of hiccup on the phone equipment. All right. Non GAAP operating profit for the second quarter of twenty twenty six was $11,200,000 compared with a non GAAP operating loss in Q1 of twenty twenty six of 5 and $50,000 and a non GAAP operating loss of $6,100,000 in Q2 of twenty twenty five.

7:15 For reference, our GAAP operating line for the second quarter of twenty twenty six was a profit of $10,400,000 compared with an operating loss of $1,600,000 in Q1 and an operating loss of $6,700,000 in Q2 of twenty twenty five.

7:31 Non operating other income and expense and other items below the operating line for the second quarter of twenty twenty six was a net profit of $705,000 The details can be seen in the P and L included in our press release today. In Q2 twenty twenty six, we returned the company to profitability. We are pleased to report a non GAAP net profit of $11,900,000 or $0.19 per diluted share. This compares with the non GAAP net loss of 5 and $85,000 or $01 per share loss in the first quarter and the non GAAP net loss in Q2 of twenty twenty five of $6,400,000 or $0.15 per share loss. On a GAAP basis, net profit in Q2 is $11,100,000 or $0.17 per diluted share.

8:17 By comparison, net loss was $1,600,000 or $03 per share in the first quarter and a GAAP net loss in Q2 of last year of 7,000,000 The weighted average diluted shares outstanding in Q2 is $63,500,000 Cash, cash equivalents and investments increased by $625,600,000 to $748,800,000 as of June 30. This was primarily the result of our secondary public offering of common stock, which closed on April 22 and generated approximately $632,000,000 before expenses. By comparison at March 31, our cash was $123,000,000 Accounts receivable increased by $4,700,000 During Q2, we signed long term supply agreements with Casella and Coherent.

9:11 Under the terms of these agreements, we received prepayments for wafers of $22,300,000 and $25,400,000 respectively. These type of agreements with significant upfront cash are an additional signpost regarding the important use of indium phosphide for high speed optical data transmission required in AI data centers. Morris is going to talk more about this in a moment. These prepayments are posted on our financial statements as a liability and they will be converted to revenue and the liability reduces as we ship product against these agreements.

9:52 Depreciation and amortization in the second quarter was $2,500,000 Total stock comp was $800,000 Net inventory was up approximately $6,200,000 in the second quarter to $96,300,000 and this concludes our report on financial numbers. Turning to our plan to list our subsidiary, Tongmei in China. On June 26, Tongmei notified the stock exchange that it was moving its applications for an initial public offering on the STAR market. This was accepted in July. AXT and Tongmei will now instead transfer our efforts towards listing on the Hong Kong exchange, which will likely take about a year to complete. We continue to believe that an IPO in China is a highly beneficial in expanding our capacity in China and the most efficient and effective way to support the rapidly evolving AI infrastructure build out.

10:49 This concludes our China development of its semiconductor supply chain to meet increased China based demand for Indian phosphide substrates. Tongmei's move to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange creates a redemption right for the $49,000,000 invested by the PE funds back in 2021. However, we've been in discussion with them and currently they all wish to continue their investment and not be redeemed.

11:17 We have sufficient cash to redeem investments should they be requested. With that, I'll turn the call over to Doctor. Morris Young for a review of our business and markets. Morris? Thank you, Gary. This is an incredibly exciting time for AXT. As Gary mentioned, we have reached an inflection point in our business where the customer demand is extremely strong for our indium phosphide material. We are committed to doubling our indium phosphide capacity in 2026, and I'm pleased to report that we are ahead of the schedule in that effort. But more importantly, I can now report to you that our revenue opportunity for indium phosphide is on track to more than triple by the end of twenty twenty six, with continued significant expansion expected in 2027.

12:18 This is happening as a result of three factors. First, we are being able to expand capacity at a faster rate than we expected. Second, we're making significant strides in driving our manufacturing productivity with new crystal growth furnace designs and increase our output. And third, our customers are moving to larger diameter substrates and higher value products, resulting in favorable pricing trends. The combination of these factors is driving a step function increase in our revenue in Q2. We recorded our highest quarterly revenue and highest indium phosphide revenue in our history, with backlog that continues to grow and now is well over $100,000,000 Customer demand continues to outpace supply no matter how fast we add capacity.

13:26 Broadly, the deployment of optical connectivity in AI data center is accelerating as hydro scalars scale GPU dense architectures and look for higher speed, lower power photonics to move data more efficiently. In the near term, we're seeing high demand from the industry migration to 800 and 1.6T transceivers modules, for which indium phosphide based lasers and detectors are essential for higher performance optical links. Longer term, hyperscalers are advancing towards near packaged and co packaged optics, which will continue to drive increasing demand for our material.

14:19 Overall, these trends point to a durable, long term build out of denser optical infrastructure and a multiyear demand cycle for our indium phosphide. As many of you are aware, the competitive landscape for high quality indium phosphide is limited to just a few players due to primarily the very high technical barrier to entry. Among our peers, we believe AXT is the strongest position to increase manufacturing capacity quickly and add the scale and quality needed to move the needle in our industry and meet our customers' requirements.

15:06 Our team in China has done an outstanding job in bringing up new lines in our existing factories, as well as innovating to drive higher productivity. In working closely with our direct customers, as well as our major end customers to understand their expected demand and roadmaps, we're well into the planning process to double our capacity again in 2027 in an adjacent location. This will make AXT by far the largest indium phosphide producer in the world. In addition to growing our manufacturing footprint, we have also made great strides in development of our six inches indium phosphide capability.

16:01 Six inches indium phosphide substrates are exponentially more difficult to produce in volume than three four inches wafers. And I'm very pleased and proud of our team's progress towards this new offering. I also want to thank our customers who have partnered with us throughout this process. We're excited to support them as we move forward with our own capability. Partnership is a cornerstone of our business philosophy, through which we have been able to deliver game changing innovation.

16:49 This dates back to the formation of joint ventures that today make up a unique and vertically integrated supply chain. And in the last ten years, our work with two globally recognized indium phosphide customers helped us to raise the bar even further our manufacturing and business processes to be able to support the rigorous standard of some of the most prestigious companies in the world. Strong partnership lifts innovation and enables both partners to achieve more. That is why one of the most rewarding aspect of our unfolding chapter in our history is the extent to which we have been able to partner with leading customers around the world, who are defining the next generation of data center connectivity.

17:52 We recently signed strategic long term supplier agreement with Casella and Coherent. And this week, we're very pleased to announce an agreement with Lumenten. These agreements deepens our relationship with these important customers, working shoulder to shoulder with them to help them deliver on their own vision and roadmaps. In addition, they gave us the even greater sense of conviction that our capacity build out is mirrored and necessary. From a geographic perspective, the massive AI infrastructure build out and the planned capacity CapEx surrounding by cloud services and AI platform providers in The U. S.

18:50 Is the primary driver for EML and silicon photonics based optical transceivers, as well as high speed photodetectors.

19:00 We believe that today, our materials are being used in multiple U. S. Hyperscalers. We that end customer use will continue to broaden. We're also seeing huge growth in China as China moves to accelerate its capability throughout the AI supply chain. Our revenue related to indium phosphide based lasers market in China more than doubled in Q2 from the prior quarter, and we expect continued strong growth in Q3. This highlights China's increasing investment in AI infrastructure supply chain for the global market.

19:47 This is a great opportunity for AXT as there is no permit required to ship our product within China. Turning to gallium arsenide. In Q2, demand for semiconductor wafers for industrial robotics and data center laser applications grew sequentially from the prior quarter. We also continue to see demand for semi insulating wafers for wireless RF devices and believe that we have a strong opportunity for market share expansion. Finally, our raw material business continues to be highly strategic to our growth plan and also generated record third quarter revenue in Q2.

20:35 As we reported last quarter, our subsidiary Jinmei is now refining high purity indium, which gives us direct control of a guaranteed supply of yet another critical material for our indium phosphide substrates. We're also investing to help Gingmei to expand their capabilities so that when AXT's demand for poly material grows, GMA will continue

21:06 to provide a meaningful portion of our raw material requirements. Globally, there continues to be a great awareness of the importance of our raw material supply chain, and we are decades ahead of the curves in developing our unique integrated supply chain. We will continue to invest in our portfolio as we believe it is a major competitive differentiator. Now in summary, we believe AXT is entering one of the most consequential chapters in our company history.

21:48 The investment we are making today in capacity, in technology and in our unique integrated supply chain position us to meet the extraordinary demand we see building across the optical and AI infrastructure markets. Our customer engagement is deepening, our visibility is improving and our competitive differentiation is strong. While we remain disciplined and thoughtful in our execution, we're confident that the groundwork we are laying now will enable transformational growth in the years to come.

22:35 With that, I turn the call back to Gary for our third quarter guidance. Gary? Thank you, Morris. As of today, we have approximately $66,000,000 in revenue that can be realized in Q3 across our substrate product lines and raw materials for which we either already have a permit to ship or for which an export permit is not required. So $66,000,000 We have a high degree of confidence in recognizing this revenue. We could see upside even significant upside to this number in Q3 should we receive permits for additional orders for which we have the inventory to support. But we do not want to stress, but we do want to stress that we cannot predict the future timing of permits or success in obtaining them for any specific customer or individual order.

23:28 We have delivered strong gross margin improvement over the past several quarters. Further improvement depends on a number of factors, including total revenue as it relates to the revenue mix by product, absorption of fixed costs and our ability to continue to drive better manufacturing efficiency.

23:46 With regards to OpEx, we expect that it will be approximately $10,500,000 in Q3 on a non GAAP basis and approximately $11,000,000 on a GAAP basis. With these factors in mind, we believe our non GAAP net income will be in the range of $0.30 to $0.32 and GAAP net income in the range of $0.29 to $0.31 We estimate share count for Q3 will be approximately 66,500,000 shares. Okay, this concludes our prepared comments. We're glad to answer your questions now. Kenneth? Thank you so much.

24:25 We will now begin the question and answer session. Please limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, press star one again. Please pick up your handset when asking a question. If you are muted locally, please remember to unmute your device.

24:53 Please stand by while we compile the Q and A roster. Your first question comes from the line of Tim Savageaux from Northland Capital Markets. Tim, your line is open. Please go ahead.

25:23 Hey, well, good afternoon from here at least. And congrats on the results and the guide. My first question is about the comments on the call about, I guess, an increased target for indium phosphide capacity for this year. And looks like I assume most of the growth you're guiding to in Q3 comes from indium phosphide. But I think we were looking at doubling from a $20,000,000 type level as the original target, maybe 35,000,000 to $40,000,000 Am I right to thinking the new sort of target exiting the year is something in the neighborhood of $60,000,000 in quarterly indium phosphide capacity?

26:11 And I'll follow-up from there. Yes, that's about right, Tim. That's exactly what we're looking at here. So that's $60,000,000 there, thereabouts. Great. Good answer. And then you're looking to double that still, I guess, exiting calendar '27. So just confirmation on that. And then, around the Lumentum deal, I wonder if you could obviously, you've got larger prepays, a longer term. I wonder if you could speak to maybe the overall size of that opportunity from a baseline standpoint or upside or however you want to talk about it. Thanks and congrats again.

27:06 Thank you, Tim. So yes, next year, we're looking at doubling, slightly more than doubling again, take our revenue to somewhere in the region of about $130,000,000 a quarter exiting the year. Yes, thank you about the Lumentum deal.

27:30 Clearly, we've got some prepayments on that, but we're not discussing the total revenue impact of that deal at this moment.

27:45 Okay. Thanks. I'll pass along. So maybe let me add one point about the capacity expansion. We are planning at least to double next year. But as you know, these target changes when in fact, I think this year we're going to more than double and it's because customer demand is just mounting.

28:14 So we are finding whatever way to increase that capacity expansion. Although, so I'm saying, although we are planning for double next year, but depends about how the business develops in the second quarter. We could find other way to even better than that. Okay, that's my sort of in a way it's a moving target, but we think it's going to be more than double in 2027. The demand is moving faster than we can move. We're doing great to move fast, but the demand is even stronger. Okay. Not much faster, but you guys are moving pretty fast. But Thanks. Appreciate it.

29:04 Your next question comes from the line of Matt Bryson with Wedbush Securities. Matt, your line is open. Please go ahead. Thanks for taking my question and congrats on the results and guide. Just when obviously, you're having a whole lot more success in getting permits. And it seems like with the coherent deal, you have to have certainty that

29:36 you're going to get permits to ship out China given the terms of that deal. I guess, you talk about how the process has changed and about how you have more confidence in getting these permits? Or what has changed?

29:55 Yes, sure. Thanks, Matt. Permits always remain a bit of an issue on the back of our minds. As Gary mentioned, it's not something that we can absolutely predict, both the timing and the certainty of, but we are seeing more regularity in the process, especially in certain geographic regions. So that's great news. And we're seeing increased demand in those geographic regions too. So we're focusing now, even with greater intensity, on capacity and allocation. But yes, right now, the permits, as I said, we're we're seeing seeing more regularity in certain geographic regions, and we're driving more and more permit applications through the Ministry of Commerce.

31:01 Awesome. That's really helpful. Second question, Gary, my math has gross margins staying relatively stable in Q3. Is that roughly the right way to think about things? And I guess as part of that, is there any more given how tight indium phosphide seems, is there any more room for price appreciation in our models?

31:28 Well, it is a moving target. Of course, I know you guys are going to quote to me that I would always say, Okay, you can go to 35%, but that's not management's target management targets the number that begins with four. I'm delighted that we got here as fast as we did. I think I would recommend stick close to what we're at right now, but I have to say again. Management target is better than that. And let's see what we can do. There's. When you add more volume that helps on your gross margin because the fixed costs get absorbed over more units and also when you add more volume in manufacturing business you get better at it so we're just experiencing a lot of positive influences right now to push this over 40% and stay at 45 for now but

32:35 put your seat belts on Well, can't help myself but make a comment. I'm a CEO, but I know my number. Okay. Look, everybody knows our indium phosphide business has better margin than the other two businesses, the gallium arsenide and JVs. Okay.

32:58 As we grow for next quarter, it's obviously all the growth happening in indium phosphide. So just by simple math, the gross margins can be better. Right, because the sales of indium phosphide is increasing and the other stuff is not increasing as fast.

33:17 So we're optimistic. That's right. Yeah, but we try and be conservative on this kind of a discussion. I want to add another point as well. Market is moving to larger diameters here too. So we're seeing a migration from two inches to three inches, three inches to four inches. And of course, now there's a big push towards six inches for the future. This gives us a great opportunity to increase our gross margins.

33:49 Yes, let's not spend on the book, but let me give you another one. Because the demand is so strong, the whole indium phosphide line is fully utilized. Let me give you an example. In the past, some of the, let's say, smaller diameter two inches, they are not in favor, so they are not sold out. And the big demand is on three inches.

34:17 Now, because the demand is so strong, the customer are forced or they want everything. So whatever we can produce, we can sell. That also will help us in terms of margin. That answers my question. Thank you so much. Your next question comes from the line of Richard Shannon with Craig Hallum. Richard, your line is open. Please go ahead.

34:52 Well, hi, guys. Thanks for taking my questions, and I'll add congratulations on an excellent quarter. Keep up the great work here. I guess my first question is, the language used for the backlog, maybe it was slightly different, but use the same number of 100,000,000,000. I think you're just saying a lot more than 100,000,000,000. Wonder if you could clarify, that number anymore and then specifically comment how much of your calendar '27 is covered by backlog.

35:27 I'm gonna let Tim answer that. So go ahead, Tim. Yes. I don't want to go into a lot of details about how big exactly our backlog is, but I can tell you that it is growing, and I can tell you it continues to grow even as we ship more material. So demand just completely outpaces our ability to increase capacity, even though we've increased capacity or we're about to increase capacity 3x this year. Just simply can't keep up with it. So backlog continues to grow, as I say, beyond $100,000,000 right now. In terms of 2027, yes, we're covered with backlog going out into 2027.

36:15 Obviously, a lot of our customers, if we could deliver the majority of that today, they would take it today, but that does cover going out into 2027. Of course, we have these long term supply agreements that take us out into 2027 and beyond as well.

36:32 We've got a lot of next year and beyond covered with LTSAs even in some cases backlog. Look, I think the other answer, why we're not giving out the backlog perhaps is that we are not taking orders if customer wants to place order. We're looking at whether we can deliver because once we take the order, we're going to put them on the production queue. Right now it's full. So it's difficult to know how much the backlog is. In fact, I think we open up the floodgate, it's going be huge.

37:19 So we're not counting on it. And as far as 2027 is concerned, I think if we want to sign up a lot of well, team is working on other long term supply agreement. But that doesn't mean that 2027 is all spoken off. That is we are measuring how much we're expanding, how much we want to sign up for long term supply agreement and some of them we want to reserve for customers coming in. So I think right now order is not a problem. Mostly is how fast we can grow.

37:59 Okay, Appreciate that perspective. Couple more questions from me. I'll jump on the line here. The next one is on a on the new phosphide here, and specifically, how much of that was shipped into China versus rest of the world? And how do you see that going over the next, say, couple of years or so? And I I ask this because you you've obviously signed up a an agreement with a, Chinese, laser company, but then also two North American based laser companies here. And and while I I I'm sure those aren't the only customers you're gonna have for indium phosphide here, I'd love to get a sense of how this ratio changes over time. Kinda what's the peak from China, and what do you see as kind of that long term stable share between China and the rest of the world?

38:48 That's a great question, Richard. So there's certainly a lot of market opportunity in China right now. As we've said, we're doubling our capacity, actually tripling our capacity in 2026, and China is definitely taking some of that capacity as we move forward. What we're seeing with the permits and with the demand globally this is a global market, remember We are seeing growth across all sectors. So China right now is definitely above 50% of our revenue in Q2. I would anticipate that we would see a revenue split moving forward somewhere in that 40 to 60 range as we build up both capacity and we build up long term supply agreements both within China and throughout the rest of the world.

39:51 So yeah, I would kind of model that as China being 40% to 60% of our revenue. Okay. Thanks for that, Tim. Last question for me is on the topic of gross margins. I know there was a previous question on this topic. I'm asked the question slightly different Gary, which is, you know, and I think even Morris commented today and we've heard this many times in the past where it posifies as a positive mix dynamic and only seemingly getting better given the pricing comments you've mentioned here. But also, we're gonna see from your capacity expansion some depreciation costs here. And so would love to get a sense of from the the number you just reported in the second quarter, which is utterly fantastic. How much more can it go?

40:37 Can you get to a number that starts with a five? Eric, well, let's see. Can we get there? It would be a record for us that's for sure but yes further increases in volume and improvements in productivity as well as continued favorable mix moving towards larger diameter substrates. We should definitely be targeting a number that begins with the five, But I don't want you to Richard. Okay. That's fine. I won't. I just want to know.

41:23 We all think of the I I won't, but I never have here. I just want to understand how how close to the asymptote we are. Yeah. You you you've been with us for a long time to cover us. And, obviously, this is, as Morris said, sort of more than an inflection point. This is huge step up. We'll try and be as specific and accurate as we can, But it's it's it's moving pretty fast. So yeah, we want to be careful what we tell you so. But yeah, we're going to target something that begins with the file.

42:09 Understood. Makes sense. And that's all the question for me. Thank you. Thanks, Wuxi. Kenneth, next. Your next question comes from the line of Charles Xu with Needham. Charles, your line is open. Please go ahead. Hi. Good morning. I guess you guys are in China right now. So the question first question I have regarding the capacity exiting the year, raising from basically 35,000,000 per quarter to 60 and the next year basically raising from 70,000,000 per quarter to one thirty million per quarter. Are those number correct? And I think previously on the previous capacity numbers, you plan to spend well, I'm looking at my numbers, 40,000,000 CapEx this year, 100,000,000 CapEx next year. Do you what's the new CapEx number? Because it does look like the capacity growth has upsized a lot.

43:22 I want to get some thoughts on CapEx. Thank you. Yes. Thanks, Charles. So the capacity is growing faster than we thought. Certainly, in terms of revenue, that comes out from a number of factors, as Maurice said. We've been able to accelerate the actual physical capacity that we have here. We are moving to larger diameter substrates, which of course helps the revenue, and we're seeing greater productivity. As Gary mentioned, moving to larger and larger volumes increases the productivity of the facility. We've seen this time and time again.

44:12 Part of the capacity increase that we're seeing here isn't just a CapEx spend, but it's a productivity and a product mix change here. That's what's really allowing us to grow the revenue quicker than we anticipated. So there's a lot going on here. Now, when you're looking at CapEx spend to get this additional capacity, there is actually not a lot of additional CapEx spend here. As I said, as we're gaining capacity through other factors rather than just hardware deployment, it means that we can gain capacity without huge additional CapEx spend on that.

45:04 Okay. So basically, sounds like you are reaffirming the CapEx plan you previously communicated. Is that right? That's correct. That's correct. Okay. The second question, once again, backlog. Maurice, I understand what you said. You only want to book the order. That's what I heard. You only want to book the order only a booked order can be put in backlog when you can commit to ship to the customers given that you are probably still trying to catch up with the demand by increasing supply.

45:51 100,000,000 plus backlog, but I think I'm looking at you're already shipping 30 plus million this quarter. Looks like implied for for for September quarter, you probably will be able to ship a 50,000,000. I wonder if you can give us a little bit more, how much more than 100,000,000 you actually can see because it sounds a little bit too low to me that your backlog only covers a little bit over two quarters of the next two quarters of the expected indium phosphide revenue at the implied Q3 run rate. So I want to get some thoughts, what exactly is your visibility now and why couldn't you why don't you book more orders and we would like to see maybe the backlog can be a little bit higher than what you just communicated.

46:45 Thank you. Yes. The backlog, as I say, we're not giving actual backlog numbers out here. I can say that it's well over $100,000,000 It exceeds two quarters, for sure. I just don't want to give out too much information about that at this time. The backlog is also covered with a lot of long term supply agreements that are in place, so there's a lot of commitment going out well beyond two quarters, in terms of backlog and long term supply agreements. So I really don't worry that this is a short term thing. And remember, a lot of this backlog here is, of course, is a factor of the permits as we wait for permits, and it doesn't include a lot of the China business.

47:46 So we can turn the China business a lot quicker than we can turn the permitting business. As Gary said, permits are certainly getting freer. They're getting quicker, but it still takes time to apply for a permit. And we cannot apply for a permit without an order in place. So let me comment on the backlog issue. The backlog, when our visibility was not good, then usually it's only one quarter or maybe two quarters issue. But right now visibility is so good that it extends out three or four quarters. So it's not a fair comparison in a way.

48:32 And the other thing is that we are actually, honestly, we're not taking orders. When customer give us their demand, we look at what we can plan the production capacity will be and talk to customers about, okay, you can place this order because we have now planned capacity, we accommodate this order. But beyond that, we are not taking orders. The backlog can be much bigger if we take all the orders, but then we're not expanding the capacity. So why are we taking an order? You understand what I'm saying? So it doesn't make any sense to give you all, we could have $150,000,000 back order. It's not the same measure anymore.

49:20 Got it. So Maurice, just clarify, backlog is not that issue. I think you've proven that's not an issue. Just want to clarify on that. But okay. There's maybe a third question I have, maybe a technology question, maybe for Morris. Morris, you guys also have a pretty strong gallium arsenide apart the line. And I'm sure you've heard about potential use of VCSEL for scale up rather than use indium phosphide for scale up. It's it's a shorter distance, and VCSEL probably has some advantages there. And wonder if you have any customer discussion around the VCSEL, around maybe supplying the gallium arsenide substrates there and how the any of the conversation going so far? Thank you.

50:16 Yes. We have customers in China who are developing VCSEL solutions. And in fact, that is a U. S. Customer also talking to us about using gallium arsenide for virtual solutions, correct? Yes, right. We're currently a supplier to gallium arsenide VCSELs for two large data center companies or labor companies. So, yeah, we do have some visibility out there. We are seeing that these technologies coexist, right? So the people that are deploying gallium arsenide VCSELs are also very, very strongly focused on indium phosphide as well. I'm seeing more focus on the indium phosphide side of the business than the VCSELs.

51:13 But as I say, the VCSEL technology has been out there for a long time, and I don't see it going away. I see an indium phosphide lasers, silicon photonics and gallium arsenide based VCSELs coexisting in this marketplace. So from what I understand, looks like the speed is the killer or is in favor of indium phosphide. VCSEL, I think it's more difficult to reach 200 gs, both in terms of laser, emitter, as well as detectors. So when you go to 200 gs, it has to be indium phosphide detectors and also indium phosphide laser work better.

51:59 I am in favor of indium phosphide for sure. The reason is that indium phosphide, we got more margins out of the supply chain and we are a dominant player in indium phosphide. So that's the issue. We have another question from Tim Savageaux from Northland Capital Markets. Tim, your line is open. Please go ahead. Hey, thanks for the follow-up. Wanted to kind of stick with that one question, one follow-up thing before I suppose that's somewhat of an outlier.

52:47 But the question is, and maybe this sort of syncs up with your China commentary, to what extent were the new deals, long term supply agreements you've announced in recent weeks contributors either to the Q2 results or Q3 guide? Or do we have a fair bit of that in front of us? That's a great question, Tim. The latter is the answer. We have a fair bit of that in front of us. We're supplying materials to back up those long term supply agreements to get qualified and get ready for them. So they don't move the needle too much on Q2.

53:35 We're going to see a bigger impact in Q3, and then we're going to see further growth moving out through Q4 and into next year and beyond. And the Casella deal doesn't start until 2027. Right. That's a good point. That's not even happening right now in terms of that contract even though we are selling stuff to them. But Great. I probably shouldn't have known that, but, anyway, appreciate that. Cheers. There are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the call back to Leslie Green for closing remarks.

54:24 Thank you for participating in our conference call. We will be participating in the Needham Virtual Investor Conference in August and the B. Riley Securities Consumer and TMT Conference in September, and we hope to see many of you there. As always, feel free to contact us if you'd like to set up a call, and we look forward to speaking with you in the near future. This concludes today's call. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.