I would still like to know what these "new innovations" are, but the news release doesn't shed any light.

Anyway, the result is a fabrication process. This means POET chips are producible in a factory on industry scale, which means industry repeatability, industry quality, industry volumes. Still further optimizations will be done:

"This new epitaxial flow process includes new innovations in the POET prototype fabrication process. These innovations were necessary to continue the optimization work of the 100 and 40-nm foundation devices of our technology."

Or has the optimazation work already been completed? The headline reads "Completion of the "3rd Party Foundry" 40/100-nm Transfer Milestone" while Dan DeSimone is quoted "This is a significant step for our "lab-to-fab" transition …" This is somewhat vague.