Recently, LightCounting, a market research institution in the optical communication industry, released the latest version of the 2023 global optical module TOP10 list.
LightCounting stated that the above chart shows the changes in the TOP10 list of optical module suppliers over the past decade or so. By 2018, most Japanese and American manufacturers had withdrawn from this market, while the rankings of Chinese manufacturers led by Innolight continued to rise. Specifically, in 2023, Innolight ranked first for the first time, and Coherent (Finisar) ranked second.
In 2021 and 2022, these two companies tied for first place on the list, but in 2023, Coherent was more involved in the poorly performing telecommunications sector than Innolight. Looking at the overall performance of Chinese manufacturers, a total of 7 manufacturers were shortlisted. In 2023, Innolight (ranked 1st), Huawei (ranked 3rd), Accelink (ranked 5th), Hisense Broadband (ranked 6th), Eoptolink (ranked 7th), HG Genuine (ranked 8th), and Source Photonics (ranked 9th). (Note: Source Photonics has equity participatio from Chinese companies and is expected to further expand its controlling stake and can be classified as a Chinese optical module manufacturer) In terms of foreign manufacturers, there are Coherent (Finisar), Cisco (Acacia), and Marvell.
It should be pointed out that LightCounting previously changed the statistical rule of excluding optical modules manufactured by equipment suppliers from the analysis, so equipment manufacturers such as Huawei and Cisco were also able to be listed. Intel was not on the list in this period. It was ranked 9th in 2022. In 2023, Intel announced the divestiture of the pluggable optical module portion of its silicon photonics business. Previously, Intel had sold millions of silicon photonics pluggable optical modules to customers, estimated to be more than 5 million. LightCounting pointed out that in 2023, all leading cloud computing companies were accelerating their investments in global artificial intelligence clusters and interconnecting them with metropolitan area networks, long-haul networks, and submarine networks to keep up with the rapid business development.
Companies such as Amazon, Google, and Meta have such a huge demand for network equipment and optical connections that each company is a market segment. Nvidia also became a new market segment in 2023. Nvidia’s suppliers, TFC, Innolight, Fabrinet, and Coherent, reported revenue growth. The revenues of all other optical device and module suppliers (tracked byLightCounting) declined in 2023, and none of them collaborated with Nvidia, at least not yet.
According to C114, judging from the performances of the four A-share listed companies on the list in 2023, it can be described as “extremely contrasting”. Except for Innolight, which began receiving orders from AI enterprises in March 2023, the performances of other major manufacturers almost all declined. However, starting from the second half of 2023, Eoptolink, Accelink, and HG Genuine also successively obtained related orders from AI enterprises and returned to the growth track.
