Optica CEO Liz Rogan Departs Following Congressional Inquiry into Huawei Funding

Optica’s CEO Elizabeth Rogan and the head of the Optica Foundation, Chad Stark, have left the organization following an investigation into Optica’s ties to Chinese technology company Huawei, according to a report from Bloomberg.

Huawei has been on the U.S. trade blacklist since 2019.

As of press time, Optica has yet to issue a formal statement. Responding to requests for comment by Photonics Media, the organization shared an internal email sent on Aug. 22 by Optica president Gerd Leuchs and treasurer George Bayz announcing Rogan and Stark's departure.

Longtime Optica CEO Elizabeth Rogan (pictured) has left the organization following a congressional investigation into Optica's ties to Huawei, a Chinese telecommunications company blacklisted by the U.S. government. Courtesy of Optica.

The House of Representative’s Committee on Science, Space, and Technology (CSST) began investigating ties between Optica and Huawei following Bloomberg’s report in May that Huawei had been secretly funding U.S. research through Optica. The report stated that Huawei had been the sole source of funding for the 2022 and 2023 Optica Foundation Challenge.

A statement issued by CSST Chairman Frank Lucas and Ranking Member Zoe Lofgren said that Optica made changes to its senior leadership last week following a board review of the Optica Foundation Challenge, which had been receiving millions of dollars in funds from Huawei, a company sanctioned by the U.S. government due to its alleged ties to the Chinese military.

“Accepting and anonymizing funds from a sanctioned Chinese company is wholly inappropriate,” Lucas and Lofgren said in a statement. “International collaboration on sensitive research topics must be undertaken with the utmost risk awareness and transparency.”

“In recent years, Congress has mandated disclosure of foreign support by institutions receiving federal funding,” Lucas and Lofgren said in a May 16 letter to Rogan. “By masking the source of the Optica Foundation Challenge funding, your organization has compromised the ability of U.S. research institutions to comply with the law.”

Optica notified the CSST on June 6 of its decision to return the entirety of Huawei’s funding for the Optica Foundation Challenge, including funds from previous years. The CSST issued another letter to Rogan on July 29, following another report from Bloomberg that called into question the way in which Optica had characterized its relationship with Huawei.

Elizabeth Nolan, Optica’s deputy executive director, has been appointed to serve as interim CEO. Courtesy of Optica.

According to the organization’s website, it has named deputy executive director Elizabeth Nolan as interim CEO. Rogan had served as Optica’s CEO since 2002, previously serving as the organization’s COO.

*This story has been updated.