MaxLinear (MXL) Q1 2026 Earnings Transcript

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Date

Thursday, April 23, 2026 at 4:30 p.m. ET

Call participants

• Chairman of the Board, President, and Chief Executive Officer — Kishore Seendripu
• Chief Financial Officer and Chief Corporate Strategy Officer — Steven Litchfield
• VP, Investor Relations — Leslie Green

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Takeaways

• Total revenue -- $137.2 million, representing 43% year-over-year growth and a sequential increase from $136.4 million in the prior quarter.
• Infrastructure revenue -- $63 million, showing 136% year-over-year increase and making Infrastructure the largest revenue category.
• Broadband revenue -- $44 million, with additional growth expected in later quarters and Europe ramping later in the year.
• Connectivity revenue -- $19 million, contributing to the overall revenue base.
• Industrial & Multimarket revenue -- $12 million, with growth expected sequentially per stated guidance.
• GAAP gross margin -- 57.5% of revenue; Non-GAAP gross margin was 59.5% with a $2.6 million delta driven by acquisition-related intangible asset amortization.
• GAAP operating expenses -- $96.1 million; Non-GAAP operating expenses were $59.9 million, with a $28.5 million delta from stock-based compensation and performance-based equity accruals and $6.5 million from acquisition-related and other costs.
• Operating results -- GAAP loss from operations was 13% of revenue; non-GAAP income from operations was 16% of revenue.
• Cash and cash flow -- Ended with approximately $89.9 million in cash, cash equivalents, and restricted cash; net cash flow used in operating activities was $8.9 million, largely due to prepayment for wafer supply to support increasing data center product backlog.
• Inventory metrics -- Inventory balance increased by $8 million versus the prior quarter, with days of inventory improving to 128 days and days sales outstanding reduced to 27 days.
• Optical data center outlook -- Management raised 2026 optical data center revenue expectations to $150 million-$170 million, an increase of $30 million-$40 million above prior guidance based on "very good visibility" into program ramps among hyperscaler customers.
• Q2 revenue guidance -- Projected in the $160 million-$170 million range, with sequential growth expected across all four end markets led by Infrastructure.
• Q2 gross margin guidance -- GAAP gross margin expected at 56%-59%; non-GAAP gross margin at 58%-61%.
• Q2 operating expense guidance -- GAAP operating expenses forecasted at $91 million-$97 million; non-GAAP operating expenses at $61 million-$66 million.
• Q2 interest and other expense -- Expected at $1.8 million-$2.2 million (both GAAP and non-GAAP), with FX volatility cited as primary risk.
• Q2 tax guidance -- GAAP tax benefit of $2 million and non-GAAP tax provision of $1 million anticipated.
• Q2 diluted share count -- Both GAAP and non-GAAP diluted weighted-average shares are expected to be approximately 95 million.
• Keystone PAM4 DSP ramp -- Keystone platform is in production at multiple major hyperscalers in the U.S. and Asia, supporting 400G and 800G deployments for scale-up and scale-out use cases.
• Rushmore and Annapurna platforms -- Customer engagement with next-generation data center products has accelerated, with production ramps for Rushmore expected in late 2026 and revenue growth from these platforms forecast to be strong into 2027.
• XGS PON and control plane penetration -- Secured a first XGS PON design win at a U.S. hyperscale data center through a tier-one OEM; data center control plane applications expected to ramp starting 2027 with "TAM in the hundreds of millions."
• Panther storage accelerator revenue -- Anticipated to "at least double in 2026 compared to 2025" due to growing design win activity among tier-one network appliance and cloud service providers.
• Wireless infrastructure momentum -- Carriers’ 5G investments and deployments with North American operators are expanding opportunities; wireless access products contributed to Infrastructure revenue growth.
• Broadband and connectivity deployments -- Large-scale deployments of single-chip fiber PON and Wi-Fi 7 gateway platforms are underway with a major U.S. service provider; European ramps are planned for later in the year.

Summary

MaxLinear (NASDAQ:MXL) elevated its full-year optical data center revenue forecast by $30 million-$40 million, now projecting $150 million-$170 million supported by hyperscale customer ramps and improved program visibility. All four business segments—Infrastructure, Broadband, Connectivity, and Industrial & Multimarket—are projected to achieve sequential revenue growth in the upcoming quarter, with Infrastructure continuing as the primary driver. Management highlighted ongoing investments in supply chain and wafer prepayments to secure capacity for expanding data center demand. The company anticipates production launches of its next-generation Rushmore and Annapurna platforms, targeting meaningful revenue expansion across 2026 and 2027. Panther SoC family revenues are expected to at least double year over year, enhancing diversification beyond optical. Future design win opportunities with key hyperscalers in XGS PON and AI system management components are set to enter ramp phases by 2027, contributing further to long-term growth prospects.

• On customer concentration, Seendripu stated, "the end customer. Even at the end customers, it is broad based. Obviously, we will be concentrated with a few during the initial ramps, and as we ramp into 2027, other data centers will come online."
• Seendripu clarified market share strategy: "Keystone provides an affirmative statement of MaxLinear’s ability to successfully get through interop, supply product at scale, and establishes our credibility as a world-class chip supplier."
• Regarding Panther's market outlook, Kishore Seendripu asserted that its potential total addressable market is "huge," and current deployment models may require "more investment" to fully capitalize on this opportunity as the market evolves.
• In response to questions about retimers and protocol standards, management committed to an initial Ethernet-based focus for the Annapurna retimer platform but indicated flexibility to pursue other standards as the market opportunity shifts.
• Litchfield addressed supply constraints by confirming proactive capacity planning, stating, "we planned well for this and worked really closely with partners. We have seen really good support and expect to continue to see that going forward."

Industry glossary

• PAM4 DSP: A digital signal processor using four-level pulse amplitude modulation, enabling high-speed optical data links in data center transceivers.
• XGS PON: A 10-Gigabit symmetric passive optical network standard used for high-speed fiber connections in enterprise and hyperscale data centers.
• AEC: Active Electrical Cable, a high-speed electrical cable with integrated signal amplification and conditioning for data center interconnect applications.
• CPO/LPO/LRO/XPO: Refers to various advanced optical interconnect architectures (e.g., co-packaged optics, linear pluggable optics, linear receiver optics, and other evolving standards) implemented in data center network hardware.
• TIA: Transimpedance amplifier, a critical analog component converting optical signals to electrical in high-speed data communications modules.
• TAM/SAM: Total addressable market (TAM) and served addressable market (SAM); market sizing terminology indicating overall and addressable opportunity for a technology vendor.

Full Conference Call Transcript

Leslie Green: Thank you, Maria. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us on today's conference call to discuss MaxLinear, Inc.'s first quarter 2026 financial results. Today's call is being hosted by Kishore Seendripu, CEO, and Steven Litchfield, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Corporate Strategy Officer. After our prepared comments, we will take questions. Our comments today include forward-looking statements within the meaning of applicable securities laws, including statements relating to our guidance for 2026 including revenue, GAAP and non-GAAP gross margin, GAAP and non-GAAP operating expenses, GAAP and non-GAAP interest and other expense, GAAP and non-GAAP income taxes, and GAAP and non-GAAP diluted share count.

In addition, we will make forward-looking statements relating to trends, opportunities, execution of our business plan, and potential growth and uncertainties in various product and geographic markets, including without limitation statements concerning future financial and operating results, opportunities for revenue and market share across our target markets, new products, including the timing of production and launches of such products, demand for and adoption of certain technologies, and our total addressable market. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties, including risks outlined in the Risk Factors section of our recent SEC filings, including our 10-Q for the quarter ended 03/31/2026, which we filed today.

Any forward-looking statements are made as of today, and MaxLinear, Inc. has no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements. The first quarter 2026 earnings release is available in the Investor section of our website at maxlinear.com. In addition, we report certain historical financial metrics, including but not limited to gross margin, income or loss from operations, operating expenses, interest and other expense, and income tax on both a GAAP and non-GAAP basis. We encourage investors to review the detailed reconciliation of our GAAP and non-GAAP presentations in the press release available on our website.

We do not provide a reconciliation of non-GAAP guidance for future periods because of the inherent uncertainty associated with our ability to project certain future changes, including stock-based compensation and its related tax effects as well as potential impairment. Non-GAAP financial measures discussed today are not meant to be considered in isolation or as a substitute for comparable GAAP financial measures. We are providing this information because management believes it is useful to investors as it reflects how management measures our business. Lastly, this call is also being webcast and the replay will be available on our website for two weeks. And now let me turn the call over to Kishore Seendripu, CEO of MaxLinear, Inc. Kishore?

Kishore Seendripu: Thank you, and good afternoon, everyone. Q1 was a strong and important start to the year, and we believe it marks the beginning of a multiyear growth phase for MaxLinear, Inc. led by our optical data center business. Revenue grew 43% year over year, reflecting strong execution, accelerating adoption of our newest products, improving visibility in bookings, and sustained momentum across our infrastructure programs. Infrastructure is now our largest revenue category, growing 136% year over year in Q1, driven by robust production ramps in optical data center–oriented platforms. We see this momentum continuing to build as hyperscalers rapidly scale AI-centric architectures.

Based on customer orders and rising visibility of the program ramps, we are increasing our expectations for 2026 optical data center revenue to a $150 million to $170 million range. We also expect a step-function data center revenue increase beginning in Q2 with expected strong run rates expanding into 2027. At the center of this data center momentum is our Keystone PAM4 DSP optical transceiver platform. Keystone is now ramping at multiple major hyperscale customers across both the U.S. and Asia, supporting 400G and 800G PAM4 deployments for scale-up and scale-out applications. These ramps validate our differentiation in performance, power efficiency, and integration.

At OFC this year, we showcased our 1.6 terabit data center platform featuring Rushmore, our 200 gigabit-per-lane PAM4 DSP; Washington, our matching 200 gigabit-per-lane TIA; and Annapurna, which is our 1.6 terabit AEC and 3.2 terabit onboard electrical retimer platform for scale-up applications. Rushmore and Annapurna are foundational to the next wave of data center optical architectures, including LPO, LRO, AECs, XPO, and co-packaged optics. With Keystone validating our ability to execute at scale, customer engagement in our Rushmore platform has accelerated faster than expected. We anticipate production ramps beginning in late 2026 with revenue growth expected to continue strong through 2027 as the next-generation speed and bandwidth cycle unfolds.

We are also expanding our footprint beyond PAM4-based optical and electrical interconnects. We have secured our first XGS PON design win at a U.S. hyperscale data center through a tier-one OEM partner as cloud operators deploy resilient, dedicated, PON-based control plane architectures spanning multiple data centers. Adjacent to compute, we have also won USB bridge controller designs with two major hyperscalers to support rack-level AI system management, which opens the door to increasing content per rack over time. Our Panther hardware storage accelerator SoC family continues to build momentum with growing design win activity among tier-one network appliance and cloud service providers. Persistent memory constraints are highlighting Panther advantages in hardware-accelerated compression, high throughput, and ultra-low latency memory access.

We are actively sampling next-generation Panther 5 with key customers, and based on current engagement, we expect storage accelerator revenue to at least double in 2026 compared to 2025. Beyond data centers, wireless infrastructure momentum is improving as carriers increase investment in 5G RAN, access, and backhaul to support cloud-connected and edge AI functionality. Our Sierra single-chip radio SoCs are now deployed with multiple North American operators, with expanding opportunities as 5G networks continue to evolve. In broadband and connectivity, we are executing large-scale deployments of our single-chip fiber PON and Wi-Fi 7 gateway platforms with a second major tier-one service provider in North America, with additional ramps expected later in the year in Europe.

These long-cycle deployments provide a stable foundation and leverage the same integration and power efficiency that clearly differentiate MaxLinear, Inc.'s data center portfolio. In summary, we are very pleased with the strong start to 2026 and are especially excited by the momentum accelerating in our optical data center business. With multiple customers entering meaningful ramps of our 800G Keystone family and broader engagement across our 1.6 terabit Rushmore and Annapurna product families across scale-out and scale-up AI architectures, we believe MaxLinear, Inc. is exceptionally well positioned for sustained transformative growth.

Our disciplined focus on execution and innovation gives us confidence that 2026 will be a pivotal year as we continue to evolve our strategy and deliver long-term value for customers and shareholders. With that, let me now turn the call over to Steven Litchfield, our Chief Financial Officer and Chief Corporate Strategy Officer.

Steven Litchfield: Thanks, Kishore. Total revenue for the first quarter was $137.2 million, up from $136.4 million in the previous quarter and up 43% from $95.5 million in 2025. Infrastructure revenue for Q1 2026 was approximately $63 million. Broadband revenue was approximately $44 million. Connectivity revenue was approximately $19 million, and Industrial & Multimarket revenue was approximately $12 million. GAAP and non-GAAP gross margins for the first quarter were 57.5% and 59.5% of revenue. The delta between GAAP and non-GAAP gross margin in the first quarter was primarily driven by $2.6 million of acquisition-related intangible asset amortization. First quarter GAAP operating expenses were $96.1 million, and non-GAAP operating expenses were $59.9 million.

The delta between GAAP and non-GAAP operating expenses was primarily due to stock-based compensation and performance-based equity accruals of $28.5 million combined, and acquisition-related costs and other costs of $6.5 million. GAAP loss from operations in Q1 2026 was 13% of revenue, and non-GAAP income from operations in Q1 was 16% of revenue. GAAP and non-GAAP interest and other expense during the quarter were $1.4 million and $1.3 million, respectively. In Q1, net cash flow used in operating activities was approximately $8.9 million. We exited Q1 2026 with approximately $89.9 million in cash, cash equivalents, and restricted cash.

The primary use of cash was due to substantial prepayment for wafers supporting rising demand for our data center low-geometry products for which we have increasing order backlog in the second half of the year. Our days sales outstanding was down in Q1 to approximately 27 days. Our inventory was up by approximately $8 million versus the previous quarter, with days of inventory improving to approximately 128 days. This concludes the discussion of our Q1 financial results. With that, let us turn to our guidance for Q2. We currently expect Q2 2026 revenue to be between $160 million and $170 million.

Looking at Q2 by end market, we expect to see growth from all four of our business segments with particular strength in Infrastructure, driven by data center optical interconnects. We expect second quarter GAAP gross margin to be approximately 56% to 59% and non-GAAP gross margin to be in the range of 58% to 61% of revenue. We expect Q2 2026 GAAP operating expenses to be in the range of $91 million to $97 million. We expect Q2 2026 non-GAAP operating expenses to be in the range of $61 million to $66 million. We expect our Q2 GAAP interest and other expense to be in the range of approximately $1.8 million to $2.2 million.

We expect our Q2 non-GAAP interest and other expense to be in the range of $1.8 million to $2.2 million, with FX volatility being the primary risk. We expect a $2 million tax benefit on a GAAP basis and a non-GAAP tax provision of approximately $1 million. We expect our GAAP and non-GAAP diluted share count in Q2 to be approximately 95 million each. In summary, with strong growth in our data center optical business and several additional high-value products still early in their market ramp, we have transformed MaxLinear, Inc. into an infrastructure-focused company.

Our investments over the past several years have brought us to this point where we are well positioned to deliver sustained growth, operating leverage, and increasing shareholder value. We are excited about the opportunities ahead and confident in our ability to execute. With that, I would like to open up the call for questions. Operator?

Operator: Thank you. We will now open the call for questions. We ask that analysts limit themselves to one question and a follow-up so that others may have an opportunity to do so as well. One moment, please, while we poll for questions. Our first question comes from Tore Svanberg with Stifel. Please proceed with your question.

Tore Svanberg: Yes. Thank you, and congrats on the momentum here. Kishore, you mentioned optical DSP revenue now tracking to $150 million to $170 million. That is about $30 million to $40 million higher than what you had expected before. Just wondering what transpired in the quarter to see such a steep increase. Is there new customers? Are you basically just seeing steeper ramps at existing customers? Any more color you can add on that additional revenue would be great. Thank you.

Kishore Seendripu: Thank you, Tore. Yes. At the time when we set the guidance, we were looking at a number of ramps and a number of customers, and we were being conservative. At the same time, we were also fairly optimistic internally that we should be seeing strong growth coming in the latter half of this year. Now, with all the visibility and the lead times that are necessary for providing the product, we have very good visibility, and the ramps are setting in very nicely both across 400G and 800G solutions.

So I think it is all about timing of the ramps and the scale of the cohorts and their ability to scale up to meet the surging demand we are seeing now.

Tore Svanberg: Very good. And as a follow-up for you, Steve: you mentioned the prepayment for wafer capacity. Are you sort of done with that now, or should we expect more cash outflows in the coming quarters? And I also noticed you increased the revolver by $30 million. Anything you can say here on the balance sheet and cash position going forward?

Steven Litchfield: Yes, sure, Tore. Consistent with what we raised back in Q4 of last year, we knew we would have some working capital needs going into Q4 as well as Q1, and that certainly played out the way that we expected. Are we through it entirely? To some degree, it depends on how much demand continues to improve. As demand improves, we may continue to see some prepayments, but you will start to see this inflect as revenues increase. On the revolver, we did have a revolver that was expiring in June, so we renewed the revolver and took it up slightly—a pretty minor move for the size and direction of the company.

Operator: Our next question comes from Joseph Quatrochi with Wells Fargo & Co. Please proceed with your question.

Joseph Quatrochi: Yes, thanks for taking the question. Maybe just a follow-up on that. Can you talk about your supply chain and capacity to support the growth that you are seeing? Clearly, the mix of your growth is a bit different than previously when you were at similar revenue levels.

Steven Litchfield: Yes, Joe, I will take this. It is no surprise there are some supply constraints out there, but we planned well for this and worked really closely with partners. We have seen really good support and expect to continue to see that going forward.

Joseph Quatrochi: And then as a follow-up, can you talk about the puts and takes in the gross margin guidance? Why would we not see a little bit more leverage on the sequential revenue step-up that is pretty significant here?

Steven Litchfield: Obvious question. This is consistent with what we have been seeing. You have heard my caution on this, Joe, and it is a little bit of the input cost—wafer cost, packaging, etc.—moving up. In a lot of cases, the industry, ourselves included, has been able to pass along these costs, and we expect that to be the case. But given the uncertainty, we want to remain cautious. You are absolutely right that Infrastructure typically drives a higher gross margin. We are very optimistic as we look at the rest of this year and into next year, with Infrastructure being a positive influence on gross margins.

Operator: Our next question comes from Timothy Savageaux with Northland Capital Markets. Please proceed with your question.

Timothy Savageaux: Hi, and congrats on the results and especially the guidance. Question on the Infrastructure side—I know that is mostly data center driven—but it looks like you grew something mid-30s sequentially in Q1, and I imagine data center was a big driver there. Given what you are guiding to, do you expect similar sequential growth in Q2 in Infrastructure?

Steven Litchfield: Thanks, Tim. We do not typically guide end markets in that level of detail. We did say that Infrastructure was going up, and we emphasized in our prepared remarks that, as we look at this year, Infrastructure has much bigger growth drivers. We have a lot of new products ramping with some new customers, so we would certainly expect Infrastructure to be a much bigger driver of growth in the coming year.

Timothy Savageaux: And to follow up, given the step-up we are seeing in Q2, do you have any comments about overall revenue growth expectations for 2026? It looks like we could be tracking, I do not know, 35% to 40%, but any comment from the company?

Steven Litchfield: We have only guided one quarter, and we are not going to change that here today. We are very excited about the growth potential that we have and the new customers and product ramps, and with the visibility we have, we start to roll into 2027 as well. We are excited to see the growth in 2026 and even backlog starting to build into 2027.

Operator: Our next question comes from Ananda Baruah with Loop Capital Markets. Please proceed with your question.

Ananda Baruah: Yes, good afternoon, guys. Really appreciate the question, and congrats on doing all the work to get to this place with DSP. It is cool to see it play out. Kishore, you mentioned to one of the prior questions, around the magnitude of the step-up in guide, that you had baked in some conservatism around program starts and ramps. Can you tell if the market ramp feels bigger than what you had originally anticipated, as distinct from conservatism? Do you have any sense if the market TAM feels bigger? And then I have a quick follow-up as well.

Kishore Seendripu: On the first question, the TAM expansion is real—or the SAM expansion even more so. The PAM4 DSP expansion is very real as both U.S. and China hyperscalers are deploying very rapidly. Depending on the architecture implementation, the amount of PAM4 DSP used can vary based on the GPU configurations, and scale-up and scale-out are both growing strongly. Our conservatism is a general positioning as a company. Do we expect more upside? Absolutely. We do expect more upside as all the programs reach full run rates. Your second question, please.

Ananda Baruah: On Panther, you mentioned Panther is benefiting from memory dynamics. Can you walk us through the ways Panther is holistically benefiting? Is it as simple as memory is short and Panther provides performance, or are there more nuanced reasons as well?

Kishore Seendripu: There is nuance to Panther. Sixty percent of data center spend is in memory, but all memory is not equal. As the AI engine accelerates, low-latency, high-capacity memory access is super important. The big benefit of Panther is it is an accelerator, so it reduces latency dramatically and improves power efficiency. It enables much more capability than just memory compression. Thus far, our use of Panther has been at the enterprise appliance level, but these enterprise storage appliances are increasingly deployed into mainstream cloud centers. There is much more to come with Panther 5 and Panther 6. We expect this year the revenues to double, and hopefully next year as well, based on the visibility we have.

Ananda Baruah: With all that said, do you feel bigger about the ultimate TAM potential for Panther, big picture?

Kishore Seendripu: In the big picture, absolutely, Panther has a lot of potential. But Panther as it is today would not be sufficient as deployment models evolve. There will be more investment required, but the TAM is huge, and we will keep converting more of the TAM into our SAM, and that will drive our roadmap.

Operator: Our next question comes from Christopher Rolland with Susquehanna International Group. Please proceed with your question.

Christopher Rolland: Hey, guys. Thanks for the question. Congrats on the strong results. In your prepared remarks or the press release, you talked about optical at multiple hyperscalers, and previously I think your messaging around optical was very broad based across module vendors. This seems like a change and might be changing customer concentration. Are you now diversifying around these key hyperscaler opportunities? Is it one or two or all of them? If you could elaborate, that would be great.

Kishore Seendripu: Thank you, Chris. It is pretty broad based. We have design wins across essentially all of the module vendors. It has taken a while to map the module vendors’ victories to various end data centers, while we did the business development work to create pull at the end customer. Even at the end customers, it is broad based. Obviously, we will be concentrated with a few during the initial ramps, and as we ramp into 2027, other data centers will come online. There is more work to do to expand further—we are only halfway there to full end data center diversification across all hyperscalers.

Keystone provides an affirmative statement of MaxLinear, Inc.’s ability to successfully get through interop, supply product at scale, and establishes our credibility as a world-class chip supplier.

Christopher Rolland: Thank you for that, Kishore. Maybe a quick follow-up. If you could talk about 1.6T—do you think design wins and the ramp will go there? Is 800G just the beginning, where they qualify you at 800G and then have plans to use you at 1.6T? And you also mentioned scale-up optical; I do not think there is a huge transceiver usage for scale-up right now, mostly scale-out. Can you talk about that and what it means for you?

Kishore Seendripu: There will be different deployment models for scale-up. Today, about 30% of optical transceiver TAM is for scale-up and 70% is for scale-out. Our participation in scale-up derives from optical transceivers as well as our 1.6 terabit electrical retimers—onboard retimers and active electrical cables. On 1.6T, there is enormous confidence out there from shipping Keystone to major data centers, and they are ramping strongly in 2026. We have rolled out our 1.6 terabit Rushmore and Annapurna family for electrical applications. This execution, plus success with module partnerships and interop completion, is creating far more pull for our 1.6T participation than I would have guessed at this point.

We hope that by the end of the year, we will have completed key 1.6T milestones and start transitioning into volume; 800G and 1.6T will likely be among the most long-lasting interconnect applications in data centers, and 1.6T will expand our ability to garner more revenue and market share.

Operator: Our next question comes from Richard Shannon with Craig-Hallum Capital Markets. Please proceed with your question.

Richard Shannon: Thanks for taking my question. Following up on DSP, your 400G and 800G with Keystone are going very well, and I heard positive comments about Rushmore. Since you seem to be gaining nice share with Keystone, to what degree does this convey directly to success in Rushmore? How do you view the potential revenue trajectory over time relative to Keystone?

Kishore Seendripu: Thank goodness for Keystone. Everything valuable takes time. It has been a long journey of investment, and now we are into Rushmore. The success of Keystone makes us an incumbent. The power of incumbency brings relationships with cloud customers and module makers, confidence in supply capability, and product quality. On the 1.6 terabit solution, I would say we are in the top tier on performance, and customers acknowledge that. They are readily developing solutions that can quickly move to the next phase of evaluations with data center folks. We are not the first with 1.6 terabit relative to two incumbent competitors, but it bodes very well.

With 1.6 terabit, ASPs increase, and as the mix becomes more 1.6 terabit, I believe that will have an uplifting effect on our revenues and gross margins, even as our market share expands.

Richard Shannon: Thank you. My following question is on cable and broadband. Last call you talked about a soft first half and calendar 2026 being down, and wondering about any update on that and whether you have visibility into when DOCSIS 4.0 starts to have an impact.

Kishore Seendripu: We had a spectacular growth year in 2025 for broadband—about 75%—so we had a pullback in Q1 with some seasonality. Looking forward, all our businesses are growing, which is a tailwind alongside Infrastructure. We expect our Broadband business to start growing from Q2 and into 2027. DOCSIS 4.0 certification happened, but some operators are still delayed on network readiness. A big growth is coming with Ultra-3.1 and 4.0 into 2027. Post-COVID, during the down period, we won market share in broadband, which bodes well for our fiber play.

Our Fiber PON business continues to grow through Q1 and Q2, and we started major deployment with a tier-one operator in North America in the second half of the year with preshipments already done, and later we have European deployments. It is all growing, and we feel very good about that recovery.

Operator: Our next question comes from Karl Ackerman with BNP Paribas Asset Management. Please proceed with your question.

Karl Ackerman: Thank you. I have two clarifications. Kishore, going back to cable and broadband, could you be more specific with respect to the June guide? It seems like most of the growth is coming from Infrastructure, but can you talk about your outlook for Broadband, Connectivity, and Multimarket—whether they can all grow sequentially in Q2? And I have a follow-up, please.

Steven Litchfield: Hey, Karl, it is Steve. Yes, all four end markets will be up. We do expect a lot of that growth to be from Infrastructure, particularly some of the data center products, but all four segments are expected to grow sequentially.

Karl Ackerman: Got it. And then just to follow up on Chris’s earlier question, is much of your optical DSP growth coming from hyper-owned designs such that you are qualifying with them directly, or is your hyperscaler exposure predominantly through module vendors providing a merchant solution?

Kishore Seendripu: Both.

Operator: Our next question comes from Quinn Bolton with Needham & Co. Please proceed with your question.

Quinn Bolton: Hey, guys, congratulations on the nice results and outlook. Kishore, I wanted to follow up on Tim’s question about the breadth of growth in Infrastructure. In Q1, was it predominantly from optical DSP, or did you see good contribution from Panther and the wireless access products as well?

Steven Litchfield: Quinn, I will jump in. Really across the board—we saw good growth from all of the products within Infrastructure. From here, data center will really break out. The other product lines absolutely contribute. Kishore mentioned Panther; Panther is going extremely well. Wireless Infrastructure, which was pretty soft last year, is improving, and we expect to see more of that this year. Those are probably the top contributors.

Quinn Bolton: Thanks. And then I know sometimes gross margin takes a couple of quarters to reflect product mix because of inventory. You had about a 30% increase in Infrastructure in the quarter and maybe a 25% decrease in Broadband quarter on quarter; I would have thought that would be a nice tailwind. Gross margins were relatively flat. Was there anything that held back gross margin given the mix shift, or do you think it is just a timing issue? The go-forward mix of Infrastructure sounds like a nice tailwind; when might we start to see it show up?

Steven Lictchfield: We came in right at our guidance. The mix is definitely continuing to improve. As I mentioned earlier, input costs are rising, and we are trying to be cautious as we look forward. But yes, it is a tailwind, especially as we move into 800G and 1.6T—those have higher gross margins. We will continue to see nice benefits on gross margin as Infrastructure grows as a percentage of our business.

Operator: Our next question comes from Suji Desilva with ROTH Capital Partners. Please proceed with your question.

Suji Desilva: Hi, Kishore and Steve. Congratulations on the progress here. You talked about 2Q optical stepping up. Are the programs all commencing ramp now, or are other programs phasing in and starting in 3Q/4Q? Just to give us a sense of layers across the year—are we off and ramping for all key programs already?

Kishore Seendripu: There are different product cycles with different drivers, and they are all kicking in now, with more catching up later in the year. It took a while for them to start deploying with the required evaluations complete. We are seeing strength in each of these layers based on the bookings we have.

Suji Desilva: Thank you. And, Kishore, you mentioned in the prepared remarks wireless infrastructure having a part in data center connectivity—perhaps interconnect or backhaul. Can you help us understand that opportunity and how big it is? Can it become a mainstream opportunity?

Kishore Seendripu: In my prepared remarks, I talked about 5G access and transport. There are a number of announced investments where there is a lot of AI at the edge and AI-enabled network infrastructure. We see telecom infrastructure players in wireless gathering momentum in deployments, which changes transport/backhaul and certain elements of access. This should provide a tailwind for wireless infrastructure. The rates of ramps will never match data centers, but you now see interest to move toward AI in the DU side of the network at the edge on the wireless side as well. We should benefit as one of the top two players in the wireless infrastructure space.

Operator: Our next question comes from Tore Svanberg with Stifel. Please proceed with your question.

Tore Svanberg: Just two quick follow-ups on your new products. Kishore, first on Annapurna—this starts with 1.6T, but can you talk about MaxLinear, Inc.’s positioning there? Are you going to go after all the standards? There are Ethernet standards, there is UALink; are you going to participate with some NVLink/Fusion protocols? Just trying to understand where you are intersecting the market with Annapurna, especially in retimers. There is a lot of hoopla about AECs because of the success of one very successful company in AECs, but what about the retimer market?

Kishore Seendripu: The market size opportunity for a silicon player in electrical retimers inside the compute server is humongous as speeds increase. You are going to see a lot of retimers. Currently, our retimer offering is Ethernet-based, naturally. However, the fundamental physics and challenges of doing a very demanding PHY for the retimer application are done now. With regard to adding various standards, that is primarily an interface game. This also lends itself to other links and stories. We are laying the framework for a platform with optionality to chase where the SAM and TAM go. At this point, we are in the electrical retimer market for Ethernet-based solutions.

Tore Svanberg: Very helpful. And on Washington, I assume that gets sold with either Keystone or Rushmore. Are you seeing designs where your TIAs are participating on other people’s DSP platforms?

Kishore Seendripu: Rushmore and Washington are sampling now. Customers are very excited about the performance. The TIA is a fundamental block not only for Rushmore-based modules but also for LPO and LRO strategies. MaxLinear, Inc. is very well known for its great RF/analog skills. For CPO, if they go bare-bones, the TIA and driver are a natural fit; if they go more sophisticated DSP-based, we already have the platform offering. As you go toward XPO/CPOs and various manifestations, the full offering is important. Washington is the first step in building a fundamental platform that will have multiple derivatives.

Operator: Our next question comes from Timothy Savageaux with Northland Capital Markets. Please proceed with your question.

Timothy Savageaux: Thanks. Quick follow-up from me on the hyperscale win for PON—the data center control/management application. Can you talk a bit more about the timing and how significant this opportunity could be? When would you expect this design win to ramp, and could it be a needle mover?

Kishore Seendripu: We just secured the win, and we expect the ramp—after qualifications—to start sometime in 2027. It is one of the first of its kind, where data centers see the value of a dedicated, reliable link to control the entire data center network. We expect this TAM to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Our expectation is that it can be quite a needle mover even next year in the second half on a run-rate basis.

Operator: Our next question comes from Richard Shannon with Craig-Hallum Capital Markets. Please proceed with your question.

Richard Shannon: Just one follow-up to dig in on the DSP side. How big could the other applications outside duplex optical DSP be—LRO, LPO, CPO, AEC, retimers, etc.—in a year or two? Could that be 10% or even 20% of the total portfolio?

Kishore Seendripu: We are still in the early innings of how this market plays out—CPOs and others are likely three years out from determining broader adoption. At this point, it is a very small share of the market from a silicon units point of view. I do not expect it to be a huge part of our revenues near term. From a TAM perspective, I would rank optical transceiver PAM4 DSPs as number one, substantially outweighing the rest; second would be electrical retimers as that happens; and third would be AECs. AECs are more point-in-time application–driven and will evolve. Near term, revenues will be massively outweighed by optical transceiver PAM4 DSP.

Operator: We have reached the end of our question and answer session. There are no further questions at this time. I would now like to turn the floor back over to Leslie Green for closing comments.

Leslie Green: Thank you all. This quarter, we will be presenting at several financial conferences, and the details will be posted on our Investor Relations page. Thank you for joining us today, and we look forward to speaking with you again soon.

Operator: This concludes today’s teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.

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