By Lisa Thompson
NASDAQ: POET
READ THE FULL POET RESEARCH REPORT
It was a busy Q2 at POET (NASDAQ: POET). With fundraising behind it and a war chest of almost $800 million, POET is buying equipment and tools and hiring people to get its orders out the door. Its customers are in the qualification stage, so order size is increasing as they get their products to their customers for evaluation. Once their customers accept the products, the big orders will begin. Most of POET’s customers are staying anonymous at least until the qualification stage ends, which may not even be this year. In the meantime, we expect the company to continue announcing orders without names attached. When POET announced earnings, it also mentioned a new $2.4 million order. This is for 1.6T optical engines, from a current customer for delivery next year. POET now has a $60 million backlog, but it is difficult to forecast revenues for the next two to three quarters, as it depends entirely on how much POET can get out the door and book.
Q2 2026 Results
In Q2 2026, POET had revenues of $570,000 versus $268,000 in Q2 2026, with over half from NREs and the rest from product. Despite shipping product, we do not expect to see cost of goods in the income statement until companies are out of the qualification stage and it is no longer classified as R&D. We expect that will not happen until the second half of next year. Total operating expenses were $20.8 million compared to $9.0 million last year.
Sales, Marketing, and Administration increased by $8.5 million. Of that increase, $4.9 million was an increase in finance advisory fees due to the capital raises, which should decline significantly going forward. R&D rose $3.2 million. We expect total expenses to continue to remain steady for the next two quarters because of increased hiring despite the savings on advisory fees. Interest income increased to $4.3 million in Q2 2026 from $533,000 in Q2 2025 due to a huge increase in cash balances.
In Q2, there was no non-cash fair value adjustment to derivative warrant liability, versus $7.6 million in the same period in 2025. This non-cash item relates to warrants issued in a foreign currency and is periodically remeasured. However, there was a derivative liability adjustment of $5.5 million this quarter and none last year.
The net loss for the quarter was $11.3 million compared to $17.6 million in Q2 2025. This resulted in an IFRS loss per share of $0.07 versus a loss of $0.21 per share last year. On a non-IFRS basis, taking out stock-based compensation and non-cash accounting, the loss was $12.1 million versus $5.8 million. The non-IFRS per-share loss was $0.07 this year versus $0.07 last year due to an increase in shares. The average shares outstanding for the quarter were 162.4 million, up 100%.
Using $796 million in cash, $5.8 million in debt, and 173 million shares outstanding, the stock trades at an enterprise value of approximately $609 million. According to Fortune Business Insights, the global optical transceiver market size was valued at $14.7 billion in 2025 and is projected to grow from $17.2 billion in 2026 to $46.1 billion by 2034, exhibiting a CAGR of 17.0% during the forecast period. POET’s product is a component of an optical transceiver, and that market is about a third of the transceiver market. If POET can secure even a small portion of that market with its unique offerings, its valuation should far exceed its current price. We believe the stock could be worth $17.50 per share based on 2029 revenues of $450 million at 15 times EV to Sales, discounted to present value.
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