Company: AAOI
Filing Date: 2025-02-28
Form Type: PRE 14A
Source: 0001104659-25-019126
Chunk: 15

Company: APPLIED OPTOELECTRONICS, INC.
Filing Date: 2025-02-28
Form: PRE 14A
Chunk 15
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 utilize our cash reserves. Additionally, a limited available equity pool may lead to reassessment of our current hiring practices and scaling back our current employee equity award granting practices, which in turn could lead to less growth and increased employee turnover. The Company strongly prefers to grant long-term incentives in equity to mitigate these concerns.

#### Shares Available for Future Awards
As of February 24, 2025, we had 130,661 shares remaining available for grants of new awards under the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan.

As of February 24, 2025, 49,651,482 shares of our common stock were outstanding. On February 27, 2025, the closing price of our common stock on Nasdaq was $24.04.

#### Summary of the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan
The principal features of the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan are summarized below. This summary does not contain all the information about the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan and does not purport to be

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a complete description. A copy of the complete text of the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan is attached to this Proxy Statement as Appendix A, and the following description is qualified in its entirety by reference to Appendix A.

#### Purpose.
The purpose of the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan is to attract, retain and motivate our employees, officers, directors and other individuals providing services to the Company and its affiliates by providing them the opportunity to acquire an equity interest in the Company and to align their interests and efforts with the long-term interests of the Company’s stockholders.

#### Administration.
The Board or the compensation committee is authorized to administer the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan. The Board or the compensation committee may delegate concurrent administration of the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan to other committees consisting of one or more members of our Board or to one or more officers in accordance with the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan’s terms and any conditions established by our Board or compensation committee. The administrator is authorized to select the individuals to be granted awards and, subject to the terms of the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan, to determine the types of awards to be granted, the number of shares subject to awards and the other terms, conditions and provisions of such awards. References to the administrator below are, as applicable, to our Board, the compensation committee, or