Mark Benadiba retires from POET Technologies' board
Ajit Manocha takes up post of executive vice chairman
POET Technologies, developer of the planar opto-electronic technology (POET) platform for monolithic fabrication of ICs containing electronic and optical elements on a single wafer, has announced that Executive Vice Chairman Mark Benadiba will retire and be replaced by Ajit Manocha.
Ajit Manocha was most recently CEO of GlobalFoundries (the second-largest semiconductor foundry in the world) and has previously held positions including Chief Manufacturing Officer at Philips Semiconductors (now NXP). Manocha will help in determining the strategic direction of the company, working closely with Peter Copetti the company's Executive Chairman and interim CEO. Benadiba, along with Copetti and Samuel Peralta, was part of a re-invigorated Board that in 2012, transformed the then-faltering photovoltaic firm into the company it is today.
With head office in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and operations in Storrs, Connecticut, POET Technologies through ODIS Inc, a US company, has developed a new semiconductor process based on a new Group III-V materials system that integrates a dense mix of active optical elements and optical waveguides together with logic and mixed-signal elements on a single chip. It offers product solutions for military, industrial and commercial applications, including infrared sensor arrays and ultra-low-power random access memory. POET has several issued and pending patents for the POET process, with potential high speed and power-efficient applications in devices such as servers, tablet computers and smartphones.
Manocha also serves on the Board of Directors for SVTC Technologies and Signet Solar. He was previously on the boards of International Sematech, the Crolles Alliance, Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (ASMC) and served as Chairman of the Board of Directors of Systems-on-Silicon Manufacturing Company (SSMC) in Singapore. Since 2012, Manocha has also served on the US Presidential Committee for Advanced Manufacturing Partnership.
