Infinera

Jagdeep Singh, Drew Perkins and Dave Welch were already proven optical-networking entrepreneurs when they founded Infinera, having previously helped build Lightera (creators of the Ciena CoreDirector) and SDL. Infinera was designed to shake up the industry they had helped create, crashing the cost structure with the invention of the first Photonic Integrated Circuit. In a virtuoso technical performance, the first PIC-based Infinera system was shipped in 2004 and the company went public in 2007.