Modern Market Research for Networking Communications
Boston, MA
Joined November 2015
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Cignal AI retweeted
We had a really fun chat with @aschmitt and @ScottWilkinsonQ from @CignalAI about what the potential Marvell + Lumentum deal would actually mean.
These guys are long time industry veterans and their inputs were very insightful.
We called them on the show just 30mins before recording time and they graciously joined.
Takes are not prepared, it’s fully off the cuff… it’s like a reaction video with no fluff.
Check it out!!
Ps: could you please do us a favor?
Please check out our sponsor @CrusoeAI using the link below and sign up for $5 in credit. Just even play around with it.
It really helps keep the show going. 🙏
semidoped.com/crusoe-x
🎙️ NEW EPISODE: Why Marvell Wants Lumentum: Vertical Integration in AI Optics With Cignal AI
Recorded the morning after the $MRVL $LITE rumor broke. Our thoughts (live with no prep!)
Andrew Schmitt and Scott Wilkinson of market research firm Cignal AI join Austin and Vik to break down Marvell's potential acquisition of Lumentum. They explain how Marvell could run the "Broadcom playbook" by bundling DSPs and optics, even at the cost of competing with its own customers.
- The driver is vertical integration, not securing laser capacity. Marvell wants to control the supply chain from chips to optics to co-design better products for AI
- Marvell's DSP customers would have to compete with a vertically integrated Marvell-Lumentum, a dynamic that has already pushed some players out of coherent
- Lumentum's Optical Circuit Switches (OCS) and high-power lasers for CPO and NPO matter as much as its current-gen transceivers
- After a 4x expansion of its Indium Phosphide fab, Lumentum can supply Marvell AND keep selling lasers to the open market
- A bidding war is possible. Could the leak be intentional, to attract suitors?
This episode is presented by @CrusoeAI. Crusoe's Serverless Fine-Tuning trains an open model like Llama, DeepSeek, or GLM on your own data, and you pay per million tokens, not per GPU hour. About $2 buys roughly 5M training tokens on smaller models. Get $5 in credit to start: semidoped.com/crusoe-x
Chapters:
0:00 Intro: Marvell & Lumentum
7:38 The Vertical Integration Driver
9:17 The Channel Conflict Problem
14:58 Transceiver Value Chain
17:38 Why Would Lumentum Sell?
21:23 Lumentum's InP Capacity
24:52 The Cost of Waiting
27:00 Manufacturing Scale Is the Moat
31:30 How AI Changed Component Value
33:43 CPO: The Integration Endgame
36:50 The 'Broadcom Playbook'
38:58 Prediction: A Bidding War
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@austinsemis @vikramskr @aschmitt @ScottWilkinsonQ
Our new report, Scale-Across: Sizing the Optical Layer for Distributed AI, puts scale-across optical spending at more than $9B in 2030 and more than $24B cumulatively from 2026 through 2030. cignal.ai/2026/10/scale-acro…
Our ECOC 2026 Show Report is Out!
CPO skepticism
NPO market hard to pin down
Marvell demonstrates 1600ZR
Coherent Lite continues its slow roll
Multiple 400G PAM-4 demos
OCS outlook firmly supported
1.6T Datacom front end favoring SiPho
cignal.ai/2026/09/ecoc-2026-…
Cignal AI retweeted
This Friday. Free for everyone. ONE SLIDE MAX.
Join Cignal AI Analysts in a Discussion with Executives from Across the Optical Industry.
Free to propose a topic, free to present, and free to attend, this forum is a meant to be a conversation with companies in different parts and development stages of the optical supply chain.
Register here: cignal.ai/2026/09/active-ins…
Cignal AI retweeted
@Lumentum’s Szilard Zsigmond is joining industry leaders at @CignalAI’s Active Insight Forum. Szilard’s session will discuss the growing role of OCS across various markets and applications.
📅 Friday, Sept. 18, 2026 | 11:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. ET
Register: bit.ly/3UNr0Ig
Cignal AI retweeted
Join us at the @CignalAI Active Insight Forum on September 18 at 12:15pm ET, as Ciena’s Dan Harding shares insights in his session, “How the Open CPX MSA enables a new generation of data center networks”.
Register for the full event here: bit.ly/4rjsMNw
Next week - Scale Across: Building the Optical Layer for Distributed AI.
Join experts from @Cisco @CoherentCorp to learn how components, hardware and network design are evolving to meet the challenges of scale-across and traditional DCI demand.
cignal.ai/2026/08/scale-acro…
Latest reports:
- @nokia Optical up 23% as AI order intake outpaces supply
- @AppliedOpto revenue hits record but mid-2027 goal seems unlikely
- @Adtran optical up 27% and a record 100ZR order
- @tower_semicond SiPho revenue up 270% and here comes NPO
cignal.ai/2026/08/2q26-vendo…
To get ahead of the questions - and to state plainly that Cignal AI does not expect this measure to stick - here is what we think: cignal.ai/2026/08/fcc-ban-on…
Big week for vendor reports: Hyperscaler capex, AXT and @Lumentum, @ecitelecom, @Corning CPO, @MediaTek 400G/lane! cignal.ai/2026/07/2q26-vendo…
OCS market forecast just jumped to $8B+ by 2030.
The next driver after Google's TPUs is the emerging GPU scale-up opportunity in Nvidia networks (Rubin Ultra NVL576), and the opportunity for SiPho new entrants.
cignal.ai/2026/07/ocs-market…
