THE ORDER OF MAGNITUDE

摘要

Wavelength-division multiplexing has now had its coming out party. Ciena Corp., a supplier of WDM systems with just under $55 million in revenue last year, came roaring onto the Nasdaq stock exchange in February. After the first day of trading, the company reached a market capitalization of $3.4 billion—more than 60 times its 1996 revenue. Little Ciena turned out to be the largest initial public offering in the history of startups.