Company: AAOI
Filing Date: 2025-02-28
Form Type: PRE 14A
Source: 0001104659-25-019126
Chunk: 11

Company: APPLIED OPTOELECTRONICS, INC.
Filing Date: 2025-02-28
Form: PRE 14A
Chunk 11
---
 an opportunity to participate in the decision-making and allow them to routinely evaluate the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan’s continued effectiveness. The duration of the share reserve is based on several assumptions, including that our grant practices under the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan will be consistent with our historical practices and usage, and is dependent on a number of other factors that are difficult to predict or beyond our control, such as changes in business conditions, our compensation programs and our stock price, that could alter this projection and our expectations.

<div align='center'>4</div>

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Overhang The following table sets forth certain information about the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan as of February 24, 2025:

| ​ | Number of new shares proposed to be authorized under the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan                                       | ​ | ​ | ​ | ​ | 2,000,000 | ​ | ​ |
| ​ | Number of shares available for future awards under the Amended and Restated 2021Plan                                          | ​ | ​ | ​ | ​ |   130,661 | ​ | ​ |
| ​ | Number of shares subject to outstanding awards of time-vesting restricted stock unitsunder the Amended and Restated 2021 Plan | ​ | ​ | ​ | ​ | 1,760,995 | ​ | ​ |
| ​ | Number of shares subject to outstanding awards of performance-vesting restricted stock units (assuming target performance)    | ​ | ​ | ​ | ​ | 1,447,284 | ​ | ​ |
| ​ | Total number of new shares available for future awards if this proposal is approved                                           | ​ | ​ | ​ | ​ | 2,130,661 | ​ | ​ |

Burn Rate We calculate gross burn rate by dividing the number of shares subject to equity awards granted during the year by the basic weighted average number of shares outstanding at year-end. Set forth below is a table that reflects our gross burn rate for the 2024, 2023 and 2022 calendar years, as well as an average over those years. We have significantly reduced our burn rate from 9.29% in 2023 to 2.21% in 2024.

| Calendar year      | ​ | ​ | PSUs/RSUsgranted |   |           |   | ​ | ​ | Basic weightedshares of commonstock outstanding |   |            |   | ​ | ​ |