We are a leading provider of high-performance analog semiconductor solutions
that enable next-generation Internet applications, the cloud connected apps
economy and the modern, networked battlefield across the radio frequency (RF),
microwave, millimeterwave and lightwave spectrum. Our technology enables next-generation
radars for air traffic control and weather forecasting, as well as mission success
on the modern networked battlefield. We help our customers, including some of
the world’s leading communications infrastructure and aerospace and defense
companies, solve complex challenges in areas including network capacity, signal
coverage, energy efficiency and field reliability, utilizing our best-in-class
team and broad portfolio of analog RF, microwave, millimeterwave and photonic
semiconductor solutions.
We design and manufacture differentiated, high-value products for customers
who demand high performance, quality and reliability. We offer a broad portfolio
of over 5,000 standard and custom devices, which include integrated circuits
(IC), multi-chip modules (MCM), power pallets and transistors, diodes, amplifiers,
switches and switch limiters, passive and active components and complete subsystems,
across more than 60 product lines serving over 6,500 end customers in three
primary markets. Our semiconductor products are electronic components that our
customers incorporate into their larger electronic systems, such as, point-to-point
wireless backhaul radios, high density networks, active antenna arrays, radar,
magnetic resonance imaging systems (MRI) and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).
Our primary markets are: Networks, which includes carrier and enterprise infrastructure
and Cloud Data Centers, wired broadband and cellular backhaul, cellular infrastructure,
photonic solutions and fiber optic applications; Aerospace and Defense (A&D),
which includes military and commercial radar, RF jammers, electronic countermeasures,
and communication data links; and, Multi-market, which includes industrial,
medical, test and measurement and scientific applications.
We have built upon a 60-year heritage of delivering innovative solutions dating
back to the founding of Microwave Associates, Inc. We utilize our system-level
knowledge and our extensive capabilities in high-frequency modeling, IC design,
integration, packaging and manufacturing of semiconductors to address our customers’
needs. Our specialized engineers and technologists located across 27 global
design centers collaborate with our customers during the early stage of their
system development process to incorporate our standard products and identify
custom products we can develop to enhance their overall system performance.
We intend to continue to expand our revenue opportunities through our market-facing
strategy of aligning our solutions with our customers’ needs and collaborating
with them during the product definition stage of their systems toward design-in
of our products. We believe this approach will allow us to sell more complete
semiconductor solutions that integrate more functions and incorporate more highly-valued
content into our products. We believe the combination of our market-facing strategy,
targeted development projects, our engineering expertise and our fabrication
capabilities enables us to identify profitable growth opportunities and rapidly
develop and deliver new products and solutions.
Many of our products have long life cycles ranging from five to ten years, and
some of our products have been shipping for over 20 years. We continue to develop
or acquire new products and technologies to improve our ability to serve our
target markets. Our growth strategy is to increase our market share, strengthen
our customer relationships and capture more design wins. As we grow our portfolio
and technology base, we believe our customers will select more of our components
for use in their systems.
We believe our “fab-rite” manufacturing model provides us with a
competitive advantage and an attractive financial model by allowing us to utilize
our variable cost structure and enabling us to adapt to changing market conditions
and customer demands. We operate semiconductor fabrication facilities at our
Lowell, Massachusetts headquarters, in Ithaca, New York and in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
We manufacture compound semiconductors including Gallium Arsenide (GaAs) and
Indium Phosphide (InP), and we are currently in the process of adding Gallium
Nitride (GaN) fabrication capacity as well. In the A&D market, a domestic
fabrication facility may be a requirement to be a strategic supplier, and we
believe our status as a “Trusted Foundry” offers us further competitive
differentiation.
We also utilize external semiconductor foundries to supply us with additional
capacity and lower costs, and to provide us access to additional process technologies.
The ability to utilize a broad array of internal proprietary process technologies
and commercially available foundry technologies allows us to select the most
appropriate technology to solve our customers’ needs. We believe our fab-rite
strategy provides us with dependable domestic supply, control over quality,
reduced capital investment requirements, faster time to market and additional
outsourced capacity when needed. In addition, the experience base cultivated
through the continued operation of our internal fabrication lines provides us
with the expertise to better manage our external foundry suppliers.
We serve our broad and diverse customer base through a multi-channel sales strategy
utilizing our direct sales force, a global network of independent sales representatives
and distributors. Our direct sales force and application engineers are focused
on securing design wins by supporting industry-leading original equipment manufacturer
(OEM) customers. Our external sales representatives, distributors and our e-commerce
channel are focused on increasing our design wins with smaller or emerging customers
early in their new product development efforts.
The growth of advanced electronic systems using analog RF, microwave, millimeterwave
and lightwave semiconductor technologies has created demand for high-performance
analog semiconductor components and solutions. The terms RF, microwave and millimeterwave
are used to refer to electromagnetic waves in a particular frequency range produced
by applying an alternating current to an antenna or conductor. A wide variety
of advanced electronic systems rely on electromagnetic waves for high-speed
data transmission or reception. We offer high-performance analog semiconductor
products for both wireless and wireline applications across the frequency spectrum
from RF to millimeterwave and beyond through photonics. We have historically
reported our revenue by reference to three primary markets: Networks, A&D
and Multi-market. Given the recent increase in the size of the Networks market
relative to other markets, and our increasing focus on Cloud Data Center applications,
beginning in our fiscal year 2018 we will begin reporting our revenue by reference
to the following three primary markets: Industrial and Defense (roughly corresponding
to the former A&D and Multi-market combined), Data Center and Telecom.
The market demand for high-performance analog RF, microwave, millimeterwave,
and lightwave semiconductors is driven by the growth of mobile Internet devices,
cloud computing and streaming video that strain existing network capacity, as
well as the growth in advanced information-centric military applications. In
addition, the increasing need for real-time information, sensing and imaging
functions in industrial, medical, scientific and test and measurement applications
is driving demand for our products.
Networks. Growth in the Networks market is driven by the proliferation of wireless
and wired devices from smartphones and tablets to data centers, as well as the
data rich applications and services they enable such as mobile Internet, cloud
computing, video-on-demand, social media, global positioning functionality and
location based services. Growth in global next-generation Internet and Internet
of Things (IoT) applications drives demand for communications infrastructure
equipment requiring amplifiers, filters, receivers, switches, synthesizers,
transformers, upconverters and other components to expand and upgrade cellular
backhaul, cellular infrastructure, wired broadband and fiber optic networks.
Semiconductor products and solutions must continually deliver greater bandwidth
and functionality as the demands of our customers and end users increase.
Our expertise in system-level architectures and advanced IC design capability
allow us to offer Networks OEM customers highly-integrated solutions optimized
for performance and cost. Our portfolio of opto-electronics products includes
lasers, clock and data recovery, optical post amplifiers, laser and modulator
drivers, transimpedance amplifiers, transmitter and receiver applications in
2.5/6/10/40/100/400 gigabits per second (Gbps) long haul, metro, data center
links and fiber-to-the-X (FTTx) fiber optic network components that enable telecommunications
carriers and data centers to cost-efficiently increase their network capacity
by a factor of four to ten times over earlier generation solutions. We match
our opto-electronic components to various lasers enabling our customers to buy
more complete solutions for their opto-electronic systems. For optical communications
applications, we utilize a proprietary combination of GaAs, InP, and Silicon
Germanium (SiGe) technologies to obtain advantages in performance and size.
For wired broadband applications, we offer OEM customers the opportunity to
streamline their supply chain through our broad catalog of active components
such as active splitters, amplifiers, multi-function ICs and switches, as well
as passive components such as transformers, diplexers, filters, power dividers,
and combiners.
Aerospace & Defense. In the A&D market, military applications require
advanced electronic systems, such as radar warning receivers, communications
data links and tactical radios, UAVs, RF jammers, electronic countermeasures,
and smart munitions. Military applications are becoming more sophisticated,
favoring higher performance semiconductor ICs based on GaAs and GaN technologies
due to their high power density, improved power efficiency, and broadband capability.
Radar systems for mapping and targeting missions are undergoing a major transition
from existing mechanically-scanned radar products to a next-generation of active
electronically-scanned array (AESA) based products. Consisting of hundreds or
thousands of transmit/receive modules commonly based on GaAs and GaN technologies,
AESAs deliver greater speed, range, resolution and reliability over mechanically-scanned
radar products that utilize a single transmitter and receiver with mechanical
steering. Military communications employing wireless infrastructure and tactical
radios in the field remain critical for allowing geographically dispersed operators
to exchange information quickly and efficiently. UAVs and their underlying semiconductor
content require innovative designs to meet rigorous specifications for high
performance, small size and low power consumption.
We believe our in-depth knowledge of critical radar system requirements, integration
expertise and track record of reliability make us a valued resource for our
A&D customers faced with demanding application parameters. Further, we have
been accredited by the United States Department of Defense with “Trusted
Foundry” status, a designation conferred on microelectronics vendors exhibiting
the highest levels of process integrity and protection, which we believe differentiates
us as a trusted manufacturer of ICs for U.S. military and aerospace applications.
For radar applications, we offer standard and custom power transistor pallets,
discrete components, switch limiters, phase shifters and integrated modules
for transmit and receive functions in air traffic control, marine, weather,
and military radar applications. For military communications data link and tactical
radio applications, we offer a family of active, passive and discrete products,
such as Monolithic Microwave Integrated Circuits (MMICs), control components,
voltage-controlled oscillators (VCOs), transformers, power transistors and pallets,
and diodes. In some cases, we design parts specifically for these applications,
while in others, our reputation for quality and our broad catalog allows these
demanding customers to reduce the cost of their high-performance systems by
designing in standard dual-use or commercial off-the-shelf parts that we have
developed for other applications. We believe manufacturing many of these products
in our Lowell, Massachusetts Trusted Foundry offers us a competitive advantage
in the A&D market because of certain A&D customers’ requirements
for a domestic supply chain.
Multi-market. Multi-market encompasses industrial, medical, test and measurement
and scientific applications, where analog RF, microwave and millimeterwave semiconductor
solutions are gaining prevalence. In addition, evolving medical technology has
increased the need for high-performance MMICs and other semiconductor solutions
in medical imaging and patient monitoring to provide enhanced analysis and functionality.
In the medical industry, our custom designed non-magnetic diode product line
is a critical component for certain MRI applications. For sensing and test and
measurement applications, we believe our patented Heterolithic Microwave Integrated
Circuit (HMIC) process is ideal for high-performance, integrated bias networks
and switches. Our catalog of general purpose GaAs ICs includes low noise amplifiers,
switches and power amplifiers that address a wide range of applications such
as industrial automation systems to test and measurement equipment.
To address our target markets, we offer a broad range of standard and custom
ICs, modules and complete subsystems across approximately 60 product lines.
Our product catalog currently consists of more than 5,000 products including
the following key product platforms: power pallets and transistors, ICs, diodes,
switches and switch limiters, passive and active components, MCMs, and complete
subsystems. Many of our product platforms are leveraged across multiple markets
and applications. For example, our application expertise with regard to power
transistor technology is leveraged across both scientific laboratory equipment
applications and commercial and defense radar system applications. Our diode
technology is used in switch filter banks of military tactical radios as well
as medical imaging MRI systems. The table below presents the major product families
and major applications in our primary target markets.
