Digital optical networking systems company, Infinera, has appointed Kambiz Hooshmand as chairman of its board of directors and the company’s co-founder David Welch to serve on the board. Hooshmand joined the Infinera board last year. He has more than two decades of experience in optical transport, routing, access, and related technologies. He was president and CEO of Applied Micro Circuits Corp. from 2005 to 2009. Before that, he held a number of senior positions at Cisco Systems Inc. including vice president and general manager of that company’s optical and broadband transport business unit. Welch was a co-founder of Infinera and serves today as executive vice president, and chief strategy officer. Prior to his work at Infinera, he held a number of senior positions at optical component makers SDL Inc. and JDS Uniphase. He played a leading role in the optical telecom industry for two decades and has more than 80 patents and some 300 technical articles to his name. His key role in the development of semiconductor laser technology and related products was recognized with the 1994 Adolph Lomb Award, the 1998 Engineering Achievement Award from the Lasers and Electro-Optics Society, and the 1999 Fraunhofer Award. Welch currently serves on the boards of the Optical Society of America and the Optoelectronic Industry Development Association. Infinera provides digital optical networking systems to telecommunications carriers worldwide. The company’s systems are unique in their use of a breakthrough semiconductor technology: the photonic integrated circuit (PIC). Its systems and PIC technology are designed to provide customers with simpler and more flexible engineering and operations, faster time-to-service, and the ability to rapidly deliver differentiated services without reengineering their optical infrastructure. For more information, visit: www.infinera.com