r/Towersemiconductor

▲ 8 r/Towersemiconductor+2 crossposts

Is $MOB Mobilicom Another Hidden Winner in the Tower Semiconductor Silicon Photonics Stack?

$MOB Mobilicom may be one of the most underappreciated microcap technology stories on Nasdaq.

The market seems to view it as a small drone-component supplier, but that misses the bigger picture.

Mobilicom is building the secure communications, control, cybersecurity, and autonomy layer for drones, robotics, unmanned systems, and remote edge platforms.

That is a much bigger market than just defense.
Yes, the defense angle is powerful. Mobilicom has already disclosed production-scale orders from a U.S. Tier-1 drone manufacturer under a $249M U.S. defense Program of Record, with its SkyHopper PRO and ICE Cybersecurity Suite integrated into loitering munitions.
That is real validation.

But Mobilicom’s technology is not limited to one defense program or one drone platform.
Its core products apply anywhere unmanned systems need secure, reliable, long-range, jam-resistant, cyber-protected communications.
That includes defense drones, loitering munitions, border security, public safety, emergency response, energy infrastructure, mining, ports, offshore operations, industrial robotics, inspection drones, autonomous vehicles, agriculture, smart cities, and critical infrastructure monitoring.

The real bull case is that Mobilicom is not just selling drone radios.

It is selling the secure nervous system for autonomous machines.

Drones need eyes.
They need sensors.
They need onboard compute.
They need communications.
They need cybersecurity.
They need control links that survive interference, jamming, spoofing, and hostile environments.
That is where Mobilicom sits.
And that is why the Teledyne FLIR relationship matters.
Teledyne FLIR previously selected Mobilicom’s SkyHopper PRO for unmanned systems after testing. Teledyne Technologies, $TDY, is not some promotional drone startup. It is a serious aerospace, defense, imaging, sensing, instrumentation, and mission-critical electronics company.
Teledyne lives in the world of sensors, imaging, surveillance, robotics, unmanned systems, aerospace, maritime systems, industrial inspection, and critical infrastructure.

$MOB technology passed testing and was selected by Teledyne FLIR, that is meaningful validation.

Mobilicom’s products can operate in serious real-world unmanned-system environments, not just lab demos.

Now connect that to $TSEM Tower Semiconductor.

Tower is becoming one of the most important specialty semiconductor platforms in the world, especially in silicon photonics, RF, SiGe, sensing, high-speed analog, and advanced communications infrastructure.
Tower sits underneath the physical layer of the next technology cycle: optics, RF, sensing, data movement, and specialty analog.
Teledyne sits in advanced imaging, sensing, aerospace, defense, unmanned systems, and mission-critical electronics.

Mobilicom sits in secure communications, cybersecurity, and control for drones, robotics, and autonomous platforms.

Those three companies are not the same business.

But they are exposed to the same larger megatrend:

Machines are becoming more autonomous.
Sensors are becoming more important.
Communications are becoming more critical.
Edge systems are becoming more intelligent.
And cybersecurity is becoming mandatory.
That is the real $MOB story.

A drone without secure communications is a liability.

A robot without cyber protection is a target.

A remote inspection platform without reliable connectivity is useless.

An autonomous fleet without secure control can fail, be jammed, be spoofed, or be hijacked.
Mobilicom’s value is that it provides the cybersecure communications and control layer that allows unmanned systems to operate in difficult, remote, contested, or mission-critical environments.

Defense is the obvious market.
But it is not the only market.

The same technology is quietly being used in oil and gas inspection, power grid monitoring, pipeline inspection, disaster response, police and fire operations, search and rescue, maritime surveillance, port security, mining automation, railroad inspection, agriculture, construction, warehouse robotics, and industrial autonomy.

Anywhere drones or robots are doing real work, the communication link becomes mission-critical.

That is why Mobilicom is much more than a defense microcap.

The company is a broader autonomy-infrastructure platform.

And the software layer makes the story more powerful.

The market may be valuing Mobilicom as if it only sells hardware.

But Mobilicom has a proprietary cybersecurity and software stack, including ICE Cybersecurity, OS3 Cybersecurity Software, and its Secured Autonomy™ framework.
That means hardware can get Mobilicom designed into the platform.

Then software can expand revenue after adoption.

That is the key.
The upside model is not just:
Sell a datalink once.
The stronger model is:
Get designed into drones and robotics platforms.
Attach cybersecurity software.
Attach autonomy protection.
Attach fleet-level monitoring.
Attach updates.
Attach licenses.
Attach recurring software revenue.
Expand from one platform to many.
That is how $MOB can potentially move from being valued like a small hardware supplier to being valued like a scarce cybersecure autonomy platform.

This is why the valuation setup is so interesting.
Mobilicom reported only about $3.4M of 2025 revenue.
That is tiny.

But it also reported strong hardware gross margins, a sharply reduced cash burn, roughly $19M in cash, and no debt.

That creates an asymmetric setup.
The company does not need to become massive overnight for the stock to re-rate.
A few more production orders could matter.
A larger Teledyne-related opportunity could matter.
A new Tier-1 drone or robotics customer could matter.
Software attach revenue could matter.
A commercial infrastructure customer could matter.
A public safety customer could matter.
A larger defense Program of Record ramp could matter.
One meaningful platform win could change the entire revenue trajectory.
And that is why I think the market is missing it.

$TSEM is showing how important specialty semiconductor infrastructure is becoming for RF, sensing, photonics, and communications.
$TDY shows how valuable mission-critical sensing, imaging, aerospace, and unmanned-system platforms can be and it’s demonstrated the advantages of better performance due to leveraging TSEM’s Sipho platform.

$MOB is the tiny unknown public company sitting in the secure communications and cybersecurity layer that these next-generation systems increasingly require and it’s all layered on $TSEM’s PH18 platform that Teledyne is publicly using.
.

Ultimately MOB looks like it is going to own a critical layer inside autonomous systems: secure connectivity, control, and cyber protection.

That layer is becoming more valuable as drones, robots, and edge systems become more common.

More drones means more links.
More robots means more control systems.
More autonomous fleets means more cybersecurity risk.

More contested environments means more demand for resilient communications.
More critical infrastructure automation means more need for secure edge networking.

That is $MOB’s bull case.
Tiny company.
Real validation.
Teledyne FLIR selection history.
U.S. defense Program of Record exposure.
Loitering munitions integration.
High-margin software potential.
Cybersecurity differentiation.
Secure autonomy positioning.
Cash-rich balance sheet.
No debt.
Low burn.

And exposure to markets far beyond defense.
I think $MOB is not being valued as a cybersecure autonomy infrastructure company.
It is being valued like a forgotten drone-radio microcap.

That gap is the larger opportunity.
Mobilicom has proven its technology and plans to scale across defense, public safety, industrial inspection, critical infrastructure, robotics, and autonomous systems**, the market may be forced to completely reprice the company.**
That is why I am bullish.
$MOB may be tiny today.

But it is already sitting in a critical layer of the stack that is becoming essential …

reddit.com
u/Confident-Cell-2549 — 7 days ago

Why This Tower Semiconductor Community Exists

The image attached to this post is the original Tower Semiconductor article submission I sent to Seeking Alpha last year.

I bought Tower Semiconductor under $30 and kept buying because I believed the market was missing a serious semiconductor thesis.

The thesis was not hype. It was based on Tower’s role in silicon photonics, RF, analog, specialty foundry manufacturing, and the AI infrastructure buildout.

In early Nov. 2025 I finally thought I’d share my thesis. Seeking Alpha ultimately rejected the submission as promotional.

See my comment below for SA’s actual response.

I also posted similar analysis in other investing communities on Reddit and was blocked, removed, called names and permanently banned.

That experience made one thing clear: a lot of stock forums are not really built for thoughtful, technical, thesis-driven analysis. Too often, the conversation turns into name-calling, lazy dismissals, or low-value replies instead of actual discussion.

That is why I started this community.
The standard here should be different.
Bring real analysis.
Bring evidence.
Bring bull cases.
Bring bear cases.
Challenge each other.
Correct each other.
Admit when we are right.
Admit when we are wrong.
Help each other get better.
This should not be an echo chamber, and it should not be a hype board. It should be a place where serious investors can discuss Tower Semiconductor and related semiconductor trends with logic, facts, and intellectual honesty.
The goal is simple: better analysis, better discussion, better decisions.
That is what this community should be about.

u/Confident-Cell-2549 — 9 days ago
▲ 9 r/Towersemiconductor+1 crossposts

Tower Semiconductor is sitting in what is arguably the most important layer of the AI infrastructure stack today.

The market clearly already understands that the AI bottleneck is no longer just compute. It is bandwidth, latency, power, packaging, and optical connectivity.

This is widely publicized, it’s no secret and no longer debated.

AI needs optics, this is an obvious fact.

So which companies can actually manufacture the silicon photonics platforms today, that are needed to make that transition scale.

Tower Semiconductor is there today and it’s expanding capacity even more…based on prepaid commitments.

NVIDIA made it clear this weekend, that it is pulling the optical roadmap forward. Optical interconnects and co-packaged optics that many expected closer to 2030 are now targeting 2028. A two year acceleration.

Tower’s own silicon photonics capacity roadmap previously named to be fully ramped by 2028…..

On Tower’s last earnings call, management said its 1.6T is the fastest-growing silicon photonics node in the industry and that Tower is “by far the majority supplier” of 1.6T silicon PICs.

*Then NVIDIA confirmed a partnership with Tower shortly after.

Tower announced 1.6T data-center optical modules designed for NVIDIA networking protocols. *NVIDIA’s Gilad Shainer said NVIDIA is collaborating with Tower to advance next-generation silicon photonics for more efficient AI infrastructure.

On the earnings call, Tower’s CEO was asked whether the company’s 5x silicon photonics capacity expansion includes incremental demand from NVIDIA and partners.

His answer was yes.

He also explicitly said that: Tower increased its SiPho/SiGe CapEx plan to $920 million. The goal is more than 5x the Q4 2025 SiPho wafer shipment capacity by Q4 2026. Over 70% of total silicon photonics capacity is already reserved or in the process of being reserved through 2028, backed by customer prepayments. A prepayment arrangement customers requested, not one Tower proposed… think about that…

Towers ramp lines up perfectly with NVIDIA’s accelerated optical roadmap.

Meanwhile…..GlobalFoundries is trying to build its way into silicon photonics through acquisition and platform expansion. That validates the market, but it also shows how hard this stack is to assemble and how far away GFS is from being able to produce at scale.. it’s far behind and it’s still using external lasers and no where near heterogeneous on chip for 1.6t…

Intel has historical silicon photonics technology, but that is not the same thing as being publicly tied to NVIDIA’s current 1.6T AI optical ramp. Intels tech is hybrid and at this point legacy tech…

Tower’s PH18/PH18DA platform is not ordinary silicon photonics. It is bleeding-edge SiPho built for the next AI bandwidth node: 1.6T today, 3.2T next, heterogeneous III-V-on-silicon integration, InP-on-silicon, laser-integrated PICs, 400G-per-lane, LPO, and CPO.

Tower has shipped at scale high-yielding, high-quality SiPho wafers.

It is already the majority supplier of 1.6T silicon PICs.

It has deep ecosystem validation from Coherent, OpenLight/NewPhotonics, Anello, Salience, AVA, LightIC, and others across AI optics, optical switching, navigation, LiDAR, modulators, and next-generation PIC platforms. It’s the choice of quantum computing XNDU and multiple DOD awarded partners for the most advance tech...

-NVIDIA is accelerating optics.

-Tower already has scale and a public partnership with NVIDIA on 1.6T

-Tower already has announced its clear 1.6T leadership on its last earning call.

It no longer takes a deep understanding of Sipho to see the picture.

Wednesday I expect TSEM to beat and substantially raise guidance. Tower is one of the current bottleneck solutions that ready now…Wednesday I expect they will let the proverbial genie out of the bottle. -I am long TSEM

reddit.com
u/Confident-Cell-2549 — 12 days ago