Dr. Mehdi Asghari has over 15 years of research and product development experience within the silicon photonics industry. Currently, Dr. Asghari is the CTO at Kotura Inc, a California based US Company, where he is responsible for technology and product development efforts. Prior to that, Dr. Asghari served as VP of Research and Development at Bookham Inc., where he was responsible for the R&D and manufacturing transfer activities behind all of Bookham's silicon-based technologies and products. Dr. Asghari holds a Ph.D. degree in Optoelectronics from the University of Bath, a M.Sc. degree in Optoelectronics and Laser Devices from the Heriot-Watt and St. Andrews Universities, and a MA degree in Engineering from Cambridge University. He has authored or co-authored over 100 Journal and Conference publications and holds more than 12 patents within the fields of silicon photonics and optoelectronics.