Marina Lyubimova
⬤ The AI infrastructure world is hitting an inflection point where the influence of major AI labs on industry-wide revenues is about to become crystal clear. 2026 looks set to be the first year when powerhouses like OpenAI and Anthropic start meaningfully moving the needle on existing players' bottom lines. This shift is pushing everyone to look beyond broad market tailwinds and hunt for genuine structural opportunities.
⬤ The market's already pricing this in. Lumentum (LITE) and Coherent (COHR) shares have been on a tear the past couple weeks, fueled by upbeat messaging during their roadshow presentations at the UBS conference. Both companies talked up the growing role of optical interconnects in scale-up architectures—basically positioning optics as the next-gen alternative to traditional copper as systems get more complex and bandwidth needs keep climbing.
⬤ Here's where it gets interesting: supply chain chatter suggests NVIDIA (NVDA) is testing both copper and optical interconnect solutions for its upcoming Rubin Ultra 576 platform. "We're looking at configurations that would use optical interconnects to link multiple 144-GPU domains," according to industry sources familiar with the evaluation. One idea on the table uses optical links to connect multiple 144-GPU clusters, which could mean future systems come in different flavors. Looking ahead, copper's hitting its physical ceiling, while optical scale-up designs might need way more bandwidth than current scale-out setups—potentially creating a whole new wave of demand for optical components.
⬤ Lumentum's locked in as NVIDIA's go-to supplier for high-power continuous-wave lasers in co-packaged optics, with serious dollar content per system. They've also got their hands in optical circuit switches, electro-absorption modulated lasers, and high-speed optical modules. Coherent's one of just two U.S. suppliers that can actually mass-produce 800G and 1.6T optical modules at scale. With Google apparently ramping up orders for 1.6T modules and Lumentum steering capacity toward higher-margin business, Coherent's looking at solid incremental demand through 2026–2028. Bottom line: optics is shaping up as a genuine structural opportunity as AI infrastructure keeps scaling up.
Marina Lyubimova
