While many seem to have taken a purely positive view on the Co.’s recent news release, I for one have mixed feelings. When looking at the statement factually, we get:

i) The company remains in discussion with several potential industry partners – Though the wording has been altered to represent a more positive view as to the eventual realization of such an event, this event has yet to occur. The statement depicting what POET would like for the partnership to encompass also illustrates the fact that nothing concrete has been established of yet.

ii) Milestones 5 and 7 have yet to be completed – This for me is a negative. These milestones should have already been achieved months ago. Though we should get word of these accomplishments shortly, this will nevertheless be within a timeframe which once again lags the original timeline.

iii) Drive for reduction of feature size to 100-nm (Milestone 8) – While this has yet to be achieved, the fact that they have managed to reduce the size down to 200nm is in my view a positive. After all, complete this milestone and we can start to play ball! I also appreciate the fact that they now have identified a path towards the success of this milestone. Additional knock is the fact that they will need to shut down the MBE post completing Milestones 5 and 7 for 6 weeks. This places greater importance on respecting the newly minted timeline for such milestones. Moreover, one would hope that 6 weeks for cleaning is a conservative estimate.

iv) The creation of design kits – While designing such kits is most certainly the appropriate manner in which to proceed going forward, the fact that they have not yet done so means that time in the future will need to be allocated towards creating such kits. How long will this take? The fact that they are moving from a research phase towards development is however a clear positive (as long as this is done with some sense of urgency!)

v) Globalization Plans – Well POET, it finally comes time to show your cards and demonstrate to us your capacity to execute in this regard.

To me, while this news release was both overdue and necessary, I continue to read this dissemination much like most others: allows one to continue to believe in the potential greatness of this company without providing enough substance (i.e. meat) for new investors to start buying into the story that most of us have been believing for years. This all the while further delaying the achievement of milestones (least we forget the annulment of milestones 9 and 10 for the time being).

The purchase of an additional 175K shares by inside investors post this release is surely a good sign. I continue to hope that much more is progressing behind the scenes than what is being described to us minority shareholders.

And what happened to the military contract we were promised last year? Not a pessimistic statement but more of a question.