Lets watch VICR here---
They appear to have reported earnings about 10 days ago.
At that time you had a double bottom @$89.
Stk appears to have reacted well and soared to $100
Then starting March 1str with this tech downdraft it fell to $87 and has since bounced to $92.
At year-end, one year backlog totaled $147.6 million, an increase of 5.4% sequentially. Turning to our outlook for the first quarter of '21. We expect continued revenue growth. We continue to address the sources of gross margin pressure and are forecasting improvement in product level profitability. Further, we do not anticipate any meaningful increases in operating expenses. While substantial further improvement in gross margin will have to await, production from our new vertically integrated expanded factory, we expect incremental revenue to drive earnings per share given the scalability of our operating model.
In 2021, we will begin to ship our new proprietary vertical power delivery modules in volume to customers developing highly advanced supercomputers.
These new OEM customer-funded products are scheduled to ship in Q3 of this year and we are excited about the future of this product line, which significantly expands our available market. As the 48-volt market continues to grow and as new customers introduce AI and HPC solutions, Vicor is extremely well positioned to meet its growth objectives for this business in the coming years. Competitors trying to catch up with 48-volt-based solutions have started to set foot on our mine field of intellectual property.
We are also working closely with several other global OEMS, with which we expect to sign agreements in the coming months. The automotive market offers Vicor, a large incremental revenue stream for 2023 and beyond in both the mild hybrid and pure electric automotive market for our high-power, high-efficiency and lightweight modular solutions. With a range of $100 to $1,500 per vehicle for our power modules, the revenue opportunity for Vicor is substantial.
We recently announced a collaboration with Boeing for a new MEO-based constellation, for which we develop the family of radiation tolerant power modules. These modules are now being sampled to other satellite customers in this emerging and growing market
There was a very funny part of the Q&A in which two guys kept stepping over each other I think one was alluding to the car market now and then the other was pushing the time frame out...
Jon Tanwanteng--
CJS Securities -- Analyst
Yes. No, I'm here. And then just wanted to address
all the new opportunities of success you've had in 2020 and heading into 2021. You've mentioned a lot of applications.
Automotive has obviously been on the radar. This new data center product that the satellite opportunity. As I understand that you're opening your new facility, as soon as you can and you need all of that capacity, just to supply current customers, how should we think of your expansion plans beyond that and the growth of these products over a 2- or three-year time line and how you're going to address those needs?
James A. Simms--
- Corporate Vice President, Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer, and Secretary
Phil, do you want to take that or
Philip D. Davies--
- Corporate Vice President, Global Sales and Marketing
You do it.
James A. Simms--
- Corporate Vice President, Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer, and Secretary
We do address it in the 10-K, which will be published on Monday.<--
Patrizio Vinciarelli--
Chairman of the Board, President and Chief Executive Officer
Yes. So generally speaking, the factor expansion gets us to the $750 million total capacity. As we had discussed in prior conference calls, as soon as the dust settles with respect to this capacity expansion, we're going to start pursuing the next phase, just to say,
as we get further out with automotive opportunities going into volume production, there is plenty of opportunity for growth. I think, in the near term, the progression with respect to the bookings and backlog should continue this quarter, we're ahead of where we were last quarter at this time. So it's a positive trend that will carry us through this year and into next year before we get to the beginning of participation of the programs.
Phil, do you want to expand on that or...
Philip D. Davies--
- Corporate Vice President, Global Sales and Marketing
No,
I think that's a great summary.
I think that the focus is going to be continued growth through data center and artificial intelligence, design-ins and wins that we've gotten as that business grows itself will grow along with it. And our expanded customer footprint will add revenues at the end of this year and through 2022.
So as we start to move to '23 when automotive kicks in, we're going to need follow-on facilities later on. So...
Patrizio Vinciarelli--
Chairman of the Board, President and Chief Executive Officer Interrupts!!
So there are various dimensions to this, right? One of the dimensions is the footprint in AI, data centers, all these applications are point of load applications, so to speak. They address the exciting current requirements of AI chips, servers opportunities. These are all fundamentally what we call DC-DC converted-type applications. As suggested in the prepared remarks, this complementary dimension of AC to DC systems, which are also called front ends, they are, in effect, providing a power system functionality, the upstream of the point of load, to the extent that we succeeded in making 48-volt, the central gravity in AI data center applications and to extent that 48-volt is also becoming the standard for a lot of electrified systems in automotive.
Phew!!!b That was like pulling teeth.>>>>>
