What does Aeluma do?
Aeluma, Inc. is a development-stage semiconductor company listed on the Nasdaq Capital Market under ALMU. It seeks to combine compound-semiconductor performance with the scale of large-diameter substrates such as silicon. The goal is higher-performance sensing, communications, and computing devices without the cost and capacity limits of small specialty wafers.
The company’s official company overview targets mobile, AI infrastructure, defense, robotics, automotive, communications, and quantum applications. Work includes photodetectors, arrays, wafers, lasers, and engineering samples. Aeluma operates 11,400 square feet in Goleta, California, while relying partly on outside fabrication, packaging, and integration partners.
Which applications matter most?
| Research dimension | Aeluma profile | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Industry | Specialized semiconductors and photonics | Commercial success depends on materials performance, manufacturability, qualification, and supply-chain scale. |
| Current stage | Development and early commercialization | Government R&D revenue is meaningful today, but large-volume commercial product sales are not yet established. |
| Operating model | Internal materials, prototyping, test, and validation; external scale partners | This can limit owned-fab capital intensity, but creates execution and dependency risk with foundries and packaging partners. |
| Core strategic tension | Broad platform potential versus narrow current revenue base | The valuation narrative depends on converting technical breadth into qualified, repeatable commercial demand. |
How does Aeluma make money?
Aeluma reports government-contract revenue and commercial product or service revenue. Government work uses cost-reimbursement or fixed-price arrangements, with revenue recognized through milestones, services, or transferred deliverables. Commercial activity includes R&D services, non-recurring engineering, development wafers, engineering samples, and small-volume chip or wafer orders.
Which revenue stream dominates today?
For the nine months ended March 31, 2026, Aeluma generated $3.879 million of revenue: $3.838 million from government contracts and $41 thousand from other products and services. Government-funded work was therefore 98.9% of revenue, providing non-dilutive development funding but exposing reported results to contract starts, appropriations, and milestone timing.
What could the mature model look like?
Aeluma’s technology platform could ultimately be monetized through wafers, chips, custom devices, engineering programs, licenses, or royalties. Product sales require qualification, yield control, and working capital. Licensing would be more capital-light, but depends on defensible intellectual property and partners’ manufacturing execution.
| Revenue mechanism | Status | Economic characteristic | Key proof point |
|---|---|---|---|
| Government R&D contracts | Primary current source | Milestone- and cost-driven; non-dilutive funding | Repeat awards, timely starts, and conversion of funded work into usable technology |
| Commercial development services | Early and small | Project revenue with customer-specific engineering | More paid evaluations and larger non-recurring engineering programs |
| Wafers, chips, and devices | Sampling and small volume | Potentially scalable, but dependent on yield, quality, and external capacity | Qualified design wins that enter sustained production |
| Licensing and royalties | Potential future model | Potentially high-margin and capital-light | Signed licenses, royalty-bearing shipments, and enforceable patent coverage |
What does Aeluma’s latest quarter show?
The latest official package is the fiscal Q3 2026 earnings release and related Form 10-Q. Revenue was $1.222 million, cost of revenue $836 thousand, computed gross profit $386 thousand, R&D $882 thousand, and G&A $1.629 million.
| Fiscal Q3 2026 metric | Amount | Comparison | Interpretation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | $1.222M | $1.255M in fiscal Q3 2025 | Revenue remained contract-driven and did not yet show a commercial volume inflection. |
| Cost of revenue | $0.836M | $0.311M in fiscal Q3 2025 | Project mix and materials can make gross margin volatile at this stage. |
| R&D expense | $0.882M | $0.471M in fiscal Q3 2025 | The company is funding platform maturation, testing, and manufacturing readiness. |
| G&A expense | $1.629M | $1.305M in fiscal Q3 2025 | Public-company costs, hiring, and stock compensation are large relative to current revenue. |
| Net loss | $(1.800)M | $1.461M net income in fiscal Q3 2025 | The prior-year profit included a one-time $2.577M derivative revaluation gain, so the comparison is not operationally like-for-like. |
| Basic and diluted EPS | $(0.10) | $0.12 basic and $0.11 diluted in fiscal Q3 2025 | Loss per share reflects both operating losses and a larger share count. |
Is revenue accelerating yet?
What does the nine-month picture add?
For the nine months ended March 31, 2026, revenue rose 16% to $3.879 million, while operating expenses rose 114% to $9.693 million. Operating loss was $5.814 million and net loss $5.146 million. Fiscal 2026 guidance narrowed to $4.2 million-$4.6 million after contract-start delays; six new engagements totaled $5 million, although award value is not recognized revenue.
Which turning points shaped Aeluma’s strategy?
Aeluma’s short history is best understood through technical, financing, and commercialization milestones. Its structure uses public equity and government funding to bridge the difficult transition from laboratory performance to repeatable semiconductor manufacturing.
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2019
Biond Photonics was formed around heterogeneous integration of compound semiconductors with scalable substrates.
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June 2021
The business completed a reverse merger and $8 million financing. The transaction created the public Aeluma structure and funded early development.
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September 2024
Aeluma won an approximately $11.7 million DARPA program for heterogeneous integration with advanced-node semiconductors.
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March 2025
$3.1 million of notes converted into 898,573 shares, and a public offering generated $12.6 million of net proceeds.
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September 2025
An underwritten offering sold 1,955,000 shares and raised $23.4 million net, strengthening liquidity while expanding the share base.
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April 2026
More than $4 million of contracts and partnerships with Tower Semiconductor and Sumitomo supported lasers, datacom, quantum, and manufacturing scale.
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May-June 2026
A NASA quantum-dot laser award and expanded engineering leadership reinforced the shift toward manufacturing readiness and commercialization.
What did the financing milestones change?
The 2025 offerings removed near-term going-concern pressure and funded hiring, supply-chain development, and qualification work. They also made the story more equity-dependent. Technical progress and financing capacity have advanced faster than commercial volume; the central question is whether the stronger balance sheet produces recurring shipments before additional dilution becomes material.
What gives Aeluma a potential competitive advantage?
Why does wafer diameter matter?
Traditional high-performance InGaAs devices commonly use two- to four-inch indium-phosphide substrates; Aeluma targets substrates as large as twelve inches. Larger wafers may yield more chips, larger arrays, and access to established fabrication infrastructure. The FY2025 Form 10-K argues this could lower sensor cost while preserving broader wavelength sensitivity than silicon.
That proposition remains unproven at commercial scale. Wafer uniformity, device yield, packaging, reliability, and customer qualification can erase theoretical cost advantages. Aeluma’s possible moat is therefore a combined process platform: materials expertise, device designs, recipes, patents, and manufacturing relationships.
How defensible are the resources?
Who are Aeluma’s main competitors?
Aeluma competes across several layers. Mass-market CMOS sensor suppliers such as Sony, Samsung, OmniVision, onsemi, and STMicroelectronics have enormous scale and customer relationships. Specialty InGaAs competitors cited in Aeluma’s filing include Hamamatsu, Sumitomo, Teledyne/FLIR, and Excelitas. AI datacom adds foundries, optical-component vendors, and photonics specialists.
Where is Aeluma positioned today?
Aeluma is technically differentiated but commercially unproven. It could become strategically important if its platform solves constraints in AI photonics, SWIR sensing, or quantum devices. It could also remain a niche contractor if qualification is slow or larger suppliers narrow the performance-cost gap.
How financially strong is Aeluma?
Is liquidity the main near-term risk?
Liquidity is a relative strength. At March 31, 2026, Aeluma held $37.780 million of cash, $40.174 million of current assets, $1.539 million of current liabilities, and $38.635 million of working capital. With $2.432 million of total liabilities, the main financial risk is not debt service but converting operating investment into recurring revenue.
For the nine months ended March 31, 2026, operating cash outflow was $1.643 million and equipment purchases were $439 thousand, implying a simple free-cash-flow proxy of negative $2.082 million. Cash burn was modest relative to liquidity, but $3.211 million of stock compensation means economic dilution must be considered alongside cash runway.
| Financial health item | Latest figure | Period | Research interpretation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cash and cash equivalents | $37.780M | March 31, 2026 | Provides substantial near-term operating flexibility for a company of Aeluma’s current revenue scale. |
| Working capital | $38.635M | March 31, 2026 | Current assets materially exceed current liabilities. |
| Operating cash flow | $(1.643)M | Nine months ended March 31, 2026 | Cash burn is lower than the GAAP loss because stock compensation and working-capital changes are significant. |
| Equipment purchases | $0.439M | Nine months ended March 31, 2026 | Owned capital spending remains modest because external manufacturing partners are part of the scaling model. |
| Financing cash inflow | $24.122M | Nine months ended March 31, 2026 | The cash increase was financing-led, principally from the September 2025 public offering. |
Which expense line matters most?
Who owns Aeluma stock, and how is it governed?
Aeluma has one common share class with one vote per share and 18,305,335 shares outstanding as of May 8, 2026. The proxy’s November 21, 2025 ownership table showed meaningful founder and early-holder stakes but no majority controller, balancing insider influence with outside-shareholder voting power.
| Holder or group | Beneficial shares | Ownership | Source period | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mark Tompkins | 2,319,988 | 13.0% | Proxy record date: Nov. 21, 2025 | Largest disclosed beneficial holder; meaningful voting influence without control. |
| Jonathan Klamkin, founder, CEO, and chair | 1,615,650 | 9.0% | Proxy record date: Nov. 21, 2025 | Founder economics are aligned with long-term platform value, while the combined CEO-chair role concentrates leadership. |
| Lee McCarthy | 977,425 | 5.5% | Proxy record date: Nov. 21, 2025 | Another significant early holder in a relatively concentrated small-company register. |
| Directors and executive officers as a group | 2,630,116 | 14.7% | Proxy record date: Nov. 21, 2025 | Insider ownership is meaningful, but public financing has broadened the shareholder base. |
What does the board structure signal?
The 2025 proxy reported four independent directors and audit, compensation, and nominating-governance committees. A classified board supports continuity through a long commercialization cycle, but slows shareholders’ ability to replace the full board.
How should investors interpret equity compensation?
At March 31, 2026, 1,883,328 options were outstanding at a weighted-average exercise price of $8.59, while unrecognized stock compensation was $13.0 million over roughly two years. Equity awards support recruiting, but per-share analysis should use fully diluted shares and track option exercises, restricted-stock vesting, and ATM issuance.
Which opportunities, risks, and KPIs matter most?
What could drive the upside case?
The main opportunity is conversion from government-funded development to repeat production. AI interconnects need bandwidth and lower power; sensing and defense markets value broader wavelength performance. In April 2026, Aeluma announced more than $4 million of contracts and manufacturing relationships; in May it described an accelerated quantum timeline. These improve credibility, not yet unit economics.
What could weaken the story?
| Risk | Financial line affected | Company-specific mechanism | What to monitor |
|---|---|---|---|
| Government dependence | Revenue and working capital | Shutdowns, appropriations, milestone delays, or agency priorities can shift contract starts and revenue timing. | Obligated awards, start dates, recognized revenue, receivables, and guidance changes |
| Qualification failure or delay | R&D expense and future product revenue | Customers may require months of reliability and system testing without committing to production. | Named design wins, qualification milestones, repeat orders, and production schedules |
| Third-party manufacturing | Cost of revenue, gross margin, and delivery | Foundry capacity, yield, packaging quality, lead times, and supplier pricing are partly outside Aeluma’s control. | Partner productivity, yield disclosures, capacity access, and customer delivery performance |
| Technology competition | Revenue growth and pricing | Large semiconductor companies and alternative photonics architectures may match performance or scale sooner. | Performance benchmarks, customer selections, competing product launches, and price pressure |
| Controls and reporting | Compliance cost and reporting reliability | Disclosure controls remained ineffective at March 31, 2026 because finance staffing and review controls were insufficient. | Remediation progress, finance hires, audit findings, and future control conclusions |
| Dilution | Per-share value | Equity financing and compensation can fund growth while reducing each existing shareholder’s percentage interest. | ATM usage, offerings, options, RSUs, warrants, and fully diluted shares |
Why does Aeluma matter for valuation, and what is the key takeaway?
A mature-company DCF is difficult because current revenue is funded development, margins are unstable, and commercial volume is unproven. A credible model should separate contract revenue from product or licensing scenarios and probability-weight technical qualification, customer adoption, margin expansion, and future financing rather than extrapolating recent growth.
Which variables belong in a DCF or scenario model?
| Valuation driver | Current evidence | Modeling implication |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue conversion | $3.879M revenue for the nine months ended March 31, 2026; 98.9% government-derived | Build separate funded-R&D and commercial-production revenue curves. |
| Gross margin | 31.6% computed in fiscal Q3 2026; project mix remains volatile | Do not assume software-like margins; connect margin to yield, volume, outsourcing, and product mix. |
| Operating leverage | $2.511M combined R&D and G&A in fiscal Q3 2026 | Estimate how slowly technical and public-company costs scale relative to revenue. |
| Reinvestment | $0.439M equipment purchases in the nine months ended March 31, 2026, plus external manufacturing dependence | Model both owned capex and supplier or working-capital commitments needed for volume. |
| Financing and dilution | 18.305M shares outstanding at May 8, 2026, plus options, RSUs, warrants, and ATM capacity | Use a fully diluted per-share bridge and scenario-dependent future equity issuance. |
| Technical probability | 36 issued and pending patents and multiple government programs, but no established volume product line | Probability-weight commercial scenarios and use a high discount rate consistent with development risk. |
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