An Ottawa-based Wi-Fi tech developer brought in no revenue in its first fiscal quarter this year as an issue with critical materials significantly disrupted its supply chain.
Edgewater Wireless (TSX-V:YFI) said its first quarterly earnings of fiscal 2020, which the year before had been $77,700, were hampered by a “post-packaging silicon chip yield issue” – in other words, problems with output levels from its semiconductor chips.
The company, which develops Wi-Fi access point technologies, said it is testing short-term changes to its supply processes to avoid the issue in future chips and hopes to resume shipping in eight to 10 weeks.
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A permanent solution to address current orders and anticipated growth is also in development, but is “subject to new capital investment.” If the new chips come to fruition, Edgewater anticipates revenue growth will begin ramping up again in six to nine months.
Edgewater said it was unable to generate any additional product or services revenues in the quarter as the company remains “thinly staffed” with workers dedicated to solving the silicon yield issues.
The Ottawa-based firm posted a net loss of $696,078 in the quarter compared with a loss of $507,798 a year earlier.
Edgewater had been on a bit of a roll leading up to this quarter, as the firm substantially boosted its annual revenues in 2019. The company is pinning its hopes on dual-channel Wi-Fi, an open-source technology that has the potential to disrupt the wireless internet industry through providing dedicated download channels for services with high bandwidth demands.