As we continue celebrating Acacia’s 10 year-anniversary in 2019, we caught up with Bennet Ih from the ASIC team who had some great stories about Acacia’s first 10 years. Bennet was employee #14 when he joined the company on March 15, 2010. And yes, he remembered the exact date he joined! At the time, Acacia’s first product was still in development. “We were a start-up selling a product idea,” he said. “Everything we did was from scratch and we worked really hard to build the company, the processes and procedures that we have today.”

Bennet says it was a former employee that recruited him to come to Acacia. At the time, he was in a management position doing ASIC design for another company. This previous company was having a hard time lining up customers which was a stark difference to Acacia even in those very early days. “Customers were very interested in having Acacia’s first product even before we had anything to sell,” he recalls. Bennet knew that having customers so interested was a great sign (and a nice change) so he quickly joined the team.

The Early Days

Like most start-ups, space was limited in the early days and employees were just happy to have a place to get their work done, even if it was small. As you can imagine, working in a small office space can lead to some funny stories. Bennet remembers one in particular. Early on, they had a finance contractor doing some work on-site in one of the few “walled” offices. For weeks, Bennet and his colleagues (who were working in the next room) kept hearing this odd ding noise that sounded a bit like your smoke detector chirp or a bird chirping. After a while, they finally figured out that every time the finance person paid an invoice, a ‘ching’ sound would go off.” Bennet said the realization that the ding meant money was leaving the company put that sound in a different perspective for everyone, and stressed the importance of bringing a product to market as soon as possible.

On a Mission to Succeed

One of Bennet’s favorite memories was a PowerPoint slide that Acacia’s first VP of Sales used to share at company meetings. The slide had a variety of company logos in different columns. Starting from left to right were columns for early engagement, memo of understanding, signed agreement, and initial deployment. “It was fun to watch new logos show up and watch other logos migrate from left to right across the slide,” he said. Bennet said that this was a very impactful way to say that the company was expanding its presence and growing its business.

According to Bennet, Acacia went from selling an idea to a real player in the optics industry. “That was incredibly satisfying,” he said. “Now I walk into our offices with all these people around, and I’m proud of what we have accomplished.” Bennet said he has worked for a number of start-ups, but it was Acacia that has been the most successful. Bennet says that being a part of the team that grew Acacia from virtually nothing to an established company gives him an enormous amount of satisfaction. “That is the best thing about my job,” he added.

Bennet still works in the ASIC team today. His current title is Manager, ASIC Verification Group. “The ASIC team needs to simulate everything ahead of time so that when the chip goes through manufacturing it works the way we designed it to,” he says. He believes that the success of Acacia’s ASIC chips is the result of the incredible talent that resides within the walls at Acacia.

Bennet gives credit to Acacia’s DSP team where he says the real magic with chips happen. “They are crazy smart people that come up with these algorithms and tell us to build it,” he says. Bennet says he doesn’t always understand the math behind it, but when they say they want something, his team gets it done. The thing that amazes Bennet most about Acacia’s DSP team is the quality of their work. “I’m not a particularly easy person to impress, but their quality has always been amazing and I have been continually impressed,” he added.

When asked what he thinks has changed the most since he joined 10 years ago, Bennet says the main difference is that he came in as an individual contributor and is now in a technical management role. He says the nature of the work really had not changed that much, but that the complexity of the chips has increased to address new markets. “Every time you add a new feature or protocol, it exponentially increases the complexity of the design,” he said. Bennet says it’s interesting to look back at Acacia’s original chips compared to the company’s newest products. “Our current chips are a fraction of the size and consume much lower power than the company’s first chip,” he said.

We asked Bennet what Anniversary wish he’d like to give Acacia. He said that he wishes many years of continued product innovation. We do too Bennet. Thanks to incredibly talented employees like you who took the chance at joining a start-up 10 years ago, we are on track to do just that.

I’m Starting a Company – Can We Talk?

Dave remembers the day clearly when he got a call in 2009 from Mehrdad Givehchi, one of the original founders of Acacia, while sitting in a Dunkin Donuts parking lot. Mehrdad told him that he and a few others were starting a new company and asked him to sit down with him and hear about it. They met soon after and that’s when Dave first heard about their vision to connect optical networks using standard silicon connections. Dave was instantly intrigued and interested. He had worked with Mehrdad previously and trusted him and his track record of success, so it didn’t matter that the company had no name and no product. After this first meeting, Dave joined as a consultant and then a few months later (in late 2009, early 2010) he joined full time as the sole mechanical engineer.

What’s in a Name?

When Dave first started working with Acacia, there were only a handful of people working together, which included Benny Mikkelsen, Christian Rasmussen and a few other employees. “They were all visionaries,” said Dave. It was around that time that they chose to name the company Acacia Communications. The team was considering naming the company after a tree because of its analogy to something that grows to be big, strong and resilient. One day they were walking around Boston Commons looking at tree names when they saw an acacia tree. They knew instantly that it was the perfect name – and that is how Acacia Communications came to be.

“The early days were like the wild west,” said Dave. “It’s fun to look back at that time considering that we are now a publicly traded company that is more structured, organized and process oriented.” In those early days, Dave remembers the excitement, the teamwork and the sheer brilliance of the people he’s been fortunate enough to work with at Acacia. “We have always pushed the envelope as far as emerging technology, so we are always working on new things,” he said. “When you aren’t doing copy-cat products and just making improvements on prior designs, it’s very exciting and that is what we did, and continue to do.”

While the early days were hectic and crazy at times, Dave said it was also a really fun time, for many reasons. “I have so great memories and one that stands out is employees playing ping pong in the hallways,” he said. “It was also funny seeing some people sit on milk crates in the lab because we didn’t have enough chairs at the time.” He says their first lab was the size of a glorified closet, but they thought it was huge. They were just happy to have a lab and they all loved what they were doing. Looking back from then to now, Dave says that first lab was about the size of one of their conference rooms today in Acacia’s Maynard office.

The Future

Dave is currently in charge of the physical layout of the modules and transceivers along with the thermal management at the system level. He works with manufacturing, operations and also hardware/layout groups very closely. He also interacts regularly with customers, noting that the culture at Acacia has always been to develop products that customers need to win in the market place. “I sometimes work with customers on a daily basis because ultimately, their success is our success so we all want them to win first and foremost.” It’s that type of mentality that has enabled Acacia to continually disrupt the optical communications industry. The company has a track record of delivering industry-first technology that has helped solve our customers’ greatest optical networking challenges.

Dave says he loves how the whole company works together to help one another succeed, and he really likes working in Maynard. “It’s a great place to work,” he said. “We have a really nice downtown and I can mountain bike at lunchtime with the two state forests nearby.”

Dave was also quick to point out the talent they have at Acacia. “The talent at this company is the brightest of the brightest! Yet even with the degrees, experience and sheer talent, everyone is very supportive of each other and if you have questions, there is always someone who knows the answer, and always someone that knows more than you.”

When we asked Dave what his Anniversary wish would be for Acacia, he said something so indicative of the culture at Acacia. “My wish is that all of our employees stay happy and healthy,” said Dave. We wish the same for you Dave. Thanks for being such a trail blazer back in the very early days. Without you and the handful of employees you worked with in that tiny glorified closet you called a lab, the Acacia we know today would not exist. Happy Anniversary to you too. #Acacia10.

In celebration of Acacia’s 10-year anniversary this year, we thought it was the perfect opportunity to highlight some of the employees that have played a valuable role in Acacia’s success. Jim Duda, an ASIC architect, is a perfect example. Jim has been with Acacia since 2011, only two years after the company was founded. He was employee #45 and you can imagine that life at Acacia was much different than it is today with our current 400 employees.

The Early Days
When Jim joined Acacia, the company had just started developing its second DSP ASIC chip and was in a small office on the 2^nd Floor of the current Maynard building. Prior to joining Acacia, Jim was already at a job he liked a lot, but a friend who worked at Acacia convinced him to at least take an interview. And he was glad he did. “When I met with the ASIC team, I was instantly impressed by the people and the technology,” said Jim. And surprisingly, at the time there wasn’t even a spot for him so he was hired for something outside of his core competency. The team at Acacia then taught him what he needed to know to be successful. Jim said he felt a little bit like a grease monkey in those early days working with all these amazingly brilliant PhDs. However, the team was a dream team. “There was not one ego and every single one of us thrived on making each other successful,” he said.

The early days were fast paced. Jim was part of a small team so they all wore multiple hats and were constantly learning new things. “There was so much energy, and while we felt like we were under water most days, we all had faith in each other that we would all execute our parts,” said Jim. The management and PhDs were also there to help along the way. They regularly gave lectures around the technology, always trying to help employees learn more and be better at their jobs. “It was, and still is, a great place to work,” he added.

Chip Day
Looking back at his 8 years at Acacia, one of the things Jim has enjoyed the most has been Chip Day. “Chip day is the ASIC team’s Superbowl” said Jim. This is when the ASIC that Jim’s team tapes out comes back into the office. Jim says his wife even puts Chip Day on the calendar because she knows what an exciting event it is for Jim and his co-workers.

“The energy when that chip comes back is just incredible,” said Jim. “Following Chip Day, everyone works together to bring the ASIC up and running, and the adrenaline flowing throughout the company is amazing.” Jim says these chip milestones have been especially memorable at Acacia because all their chips have worked first time. “This is clearly the result of the engineering talent at Acacia, the way our whole company comes together and supports one another, and the policies and procedures we have developed to make sure everything goes as planned.”

When asked how he thinks Acacia’s chips compare to the competition, Jim was quick to point out how Acacia’s products have always had great performance and very low power. “I have always been proud of that,” he said. “We have developed a unique process that enables us to consistently deliver high-quality products with increasingly lower power.”

How Things Have Changed
When asked what things have changed in 8 years, Jim says it’s the availability of tools and resources. “We have been fortunate to grow at a steady pace, allowing us to invest in our infrastructure so that we can be more successful and more aggressive,” he said. However, while Jim says that they now have a lot more people and more expensive tools, they still have the same hard-working attitude and winning culture that was so apparent when he was just employee #45. They also still have one common priority: they know that in order for Acacia to succeed, its customers have to succeed first. “Whether you look back 8 years or back one day, we all would do anything to help our customers succeed,” he said.

Jim says he loves working in the Maynard area with all the shops and restaurants and he also really values working for such a great company. “Acacia is so much more than just a job,” said Jim. A perfect example is the personal trainer Acacia hired that runs exercise classes throughout the week. “This helps reduce stress tremendously,” he said. “Acacia really understands the mind/body connection and as a result, we all just love what we do. At the end of my day, I feel as though I just walked through the door, yet it’s already time to go home.”

When asked what wish he would send to Acacia for its 10-year anniversary, Jim reflected on the company’s history. “When we first started, we were huge innovators in our marketplace and we really disrupted how coherent technology would work. My wish is that Acacia expands our scope so we can become a disruptor in other markets as well.” Jim says he believes that could happen because Acacia still has the great people and technology it did in the early days.

Jim also had another wish for Acacia based on his own personal life. As a father of two girls and two granddaughters, he hopes to see Acacia and other companies in the telecommunications space become more gender diversified. Interestingly, a few days after this interview, Acacia announced that it had appointed Laurinda Pang to its Board of Directors. Clearly, Acacia is on its way to making Jim’s wish come true and we are proud to be a driving force for gender diversity in the optical communications industry.

Jim says that even after 8 years he still loves coming to work every day. “Not many people can look back 8 or 9 years and still absolutely love their job,” says Jim. “I have been at a lot of start-ups and Acacia ranks at the top of the list. And now, as a growing public company, I believe we have a plan, we are executing, and we are all enjoying the ride along the way.”