Aeluma, Inc.

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to Aluma's Q2 fiscal year 2026 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. Please be advised that today's conference call is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the call over to Alex Vialta, Investor Relations for Aluma. Please go ahead.

Good afternoon, and welcome to Illuma's second quarter fiscal 2026 earnings call. I'm here today with founder and CEO Jonathan Clampkin and CFO Christopher Stewart. Today's discussions and responses to questions may include forward-looking statements, which are subject to various risks and uncertainties that could cause our actual results to differ materially from these statements. These risks and uncertainties are detailed in the earnings press release issued today along with the reports filed with the US SEC. These reports, along with today's earnings release, can be found under the investor section of our website. Illuma assumes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances that may arise after the date of this call. Throughout the discussion, the company will refer to non-GAAP financial measures, including EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA. A reconciliation of non-GAAP financial measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures is included in the earnings press release and SEC filings. Now, I'll turn the call over to Illuma's CEO, Jonathan Clampkin.

Thank you, Alex, and thank you all for joining today's call. To begin, I would like to share some enlightening numbers I heard recently at the PIC Summit in Sunnyvale, an event aligned with the SPIE Photonics West Cons that Illuma participated in. An executive from Celestial AI, the photonics company recently acquired by Marvell, stated that the top four hyperscalers invested more than $300 billion in data center CapEx in 2025. And this number is expected to surpass $1 trillion in 2029. This is a significant market opportunity now and for the next several years. It is also an opportunity for new technology and product introduction. Higher performance is needed, higher volumes are needed, and cost is critical. The Aluma platform wins on all of these metrics. And while data centers represent a very important market for Aluma, this is only one of three primary near-term target markets that also include mobile and defense. and activities for us are busier than ever across each of these markets. We are witnessing our vision come to life as mobile and consumer electronics OEMs position their supply chains to adopt shortwave infrared, or SWIR, sensors. SWIR sensors have been around for many years, primarily in the defense, aerospace, and industrial markets for applications such as imaging and machine vision. Indium gallium arsenide, or ingas, one of Illuma's primary semiconductor materials, has been the benchmark for SWIR because of its best-in-class performance. But incumbent ingas technology is expensive and doesn't scale. If only ingas could be lower cost. I've heard this for decades. If only, then ingas sensors would be in every mobile phone, tablet, PC, and other consumer product. The mobile market is getting ready to adopt SWIR, and as we know, Illuma's manufacturing platform enables the scale required for mass markets. In the second quarter, we continued to execute our commitments and remained sharply focused on our transition to commercialization. Conversations with key customers have shifted from interest and evaluation to pricing and planning. At this pivotal time, I am delighted to welcome Bush Nesser as Aluma's new Senior Vice President of Business Development and Product. Bush held key roles at JDSU, now Lumentum, overseeing sales, product marketing, and management for high-speed receiver product lines. What a great match for Aluma and our scalable detector technology. Busch's three decades of experience with semiconductor photonics span optical networking in data centers, sensing, and quantum. In addition to JDSU Lumentum, Busch held leadership roles at SCD USA, one of the largest suppliers of infrared sensors, and Princeton LightWave, where he launched commercial laser, and biomedical detector products. Bush is the perfect fit for Illuma at this stage when we are seeing increasing requests for quotation and have begun taking sales orders. While initial orders are relatively small in value, this marks an important milestone toward broader market adoption. Bush has a track record of taking technology to product, driving market adoption, and growing revenue. He will accelerate our go-to-market strategy, building on the significant customer traction achieved today. In addition to Bush's appointment, we added experienced leadership and technical talent across supply chain and engineering. These other key appointments have strengthened our manufacturing partner relationships as we increase operations with foundries. Ships are yielding and performing as we qualify our processes for target markets. We will continue to expand the team and also evaluate strategic opportunities to accelerate our growth. Earlier, we announced the win with NASA to invest further in our platform for quantum photonics. We also received additional contract funding to integrate quantum dot lasers directly into the AIM Photonics 300 millimeter silicon photonics platform. This technology could be a game changer for the photonics industry across AI, data centers, sensing, and quantum. Additionally, we received several award notices recently for later stage R&D efforts and transition opportunities, reinforcing confidence in Illumis technology and expectations for additional contracts this year. In January, our team was very active at the SPIE Photonics West Technical Conference and Exhibition. a presentation was delivered that showcased our scalable semiconductor platform for quantum. To provide color, Aluma is a technology company and not a system integrator. However, we believe our platform has more potential than those developed by major quantum system companies. Compared to alternatives such as lithium niobate or barium titanate, Illuma's heterogeneous integration on silicon may provide the path forward to scalable quantum photonic systems. Our booth at the exhibition was also busy. We held important meetings with existing customers and partners and also discussed Illuma's technology with many new leads across key markets. Important people came to see Illuma. The word is out and the buzz continues to grow. We were visited by individuals from the mobile market, the data center market, the defense market, and the quantum market, among others. We also took another step to deepen our presence in defense and commercial markets with admission to the Midwest Microelectronics Consortium, or MMEC, in November. This is a key hub within the Department of War's Microelectronics Commons, which is focused on transitioning critical technologies from the lab into domestic manufacturing. Hub themes directly align with the Loomis technology, which addresses AI hardware, electronic warfare, quantum, and infrared sensing. Simply put, the MMEC expands our reach while reaffirming our role in future-proofing America's leadership in semiconductors. External recognition continued, with Aluma being named a 2025 LEAP Award winner for Advanced Materials Innovation. This award recognized our wafer-scale SWIR photo detector platform and highlights the competitive advantage of combining best-in-class materials with scalable manufacturing. Importantly, this independent validation enhances our credibility and relevance across multiple high-growth markets. At the same time, we continue to strengthen the foundation of our business, We expanded our patent portfolio to 35 issued and pending patents. Our mindset is to leave no stone unturned when it comes to establishing a footprint in our target markets. Taken together, these achievements underscore clear themes. Momentum is building, visibility is rising, engagement is translating into opportunity. The time is now to capitalize on our progress and the growing market horizon and to pursue strategic opportunities to accelerate our path to commercialization. As we move through fiscal 2026, we remain intensely focused on commercialization and on delivering long-term value. Now, I'll turn the call over to our CFO, Chris Stewart, to discuss the financials.