Quan and Baba express caution in their recent posts.  Without a pandemic in full swing I would say that the news of 4 month warrant extensions, progress on DenseLight sale payments and news that despite pulling out of the OFC conference any concern has been mitigated by the positive response received after remote internet contact with those companies and analysts they wished to target.  All good strong signals that POET management are flexible, nimble and confident and taking sensible measures to protect their staff.

 No need to be glum then, as reading between the lines my guess is that that Customer One, who has been given the first to market opportunity by POET's focus on their requirements, has signalled to the company that they are happy.  But please don't get ahead with SP predictions we should expect volatility until concrete announcements on the Customer One front and/or real expressions of interest from those targeted remotely OFC companies .

 Covid-19 will change the way companies operate in the future as businesses come to terms with remote operations using the ever greater speed and efficiency that products like the POET Optical Interposer and its PIC now offer to communications and streaming.  They work and are available now to meet companies requirements.  Interesting was the focus stated in the news report on those companies that can most benefit and have stated positive interest.

Finally, Sad to see the problems for Italy due to the high death rate and military convoys moving those who have perished.  A stark warning to all of us to follow the self isolation, social distancing and hygiene rules necessary to fight the pandemic.

 Forgive me for including the following but this is a front line respiratory specialist's experience of Covid-19 in London UK.  Us oldies are particularly at risk and younger ones less so.  Underlying medical conditions a catalyst for more extreme symptoms of the virus.

sula

Consultant in acute and respiratory medicine at Northwick Park hospital in north London has passed on this

Hi everyone

Just want to say – I’ve seen quite a few people with Covid 19 since Sunday.  The vast majority are fine.  They seem to have one week of fever, a few days of dry cough and then sometimes breathlessness on day 8 or 9.  Most people are fine to stay at home and recover in about 10 days.  If it is going to be bad it is around day 9 or 10 and the breathlessness gets rapidly worse at that point.  We have had five patients who needed ITU but they all have heart or lung disease, and are quite elderly.  Thankfully children seem to be invincible.

 I’ve never known anything like this – but we’re planning for huge numbers of people needing intensive care and working out how to cope.  We’ve managed to segregate our whole hospital into unknown (in single rooms), positive and negative areas.  We’ve moved a whole intensive care unit and 4 other wards in 3 days flat – this sort of change usually takes at least 6 months to get agreed!

 I think we need to worry about our elderly relatives but not our age group or our kids.  It seems pretty clear that a large proportion of the UK will get this, hopefully spread out over months rather than all at once like Italy.  Once enough people have had it then herd immunity will mean it dies out.  So if the frail elderly can hibernate for a few months hopefully we can keep mortality down.

 Anyway, if you have any Covid-19 questions, I know an awful lot more about it now than I did 2 weeks ago, so feel free to ask!

Dr Rachel Tennant

Consultant in Respiratory & Acute Medicine

Clinical Director for Acute Medicine.