This article first appeared on GuruFocus.
Corning (NYSE:GLW) suddenly looks a lot more interesting after inking a massive deal with Meta, and Wall Street thinks this one could really change the trajectory of its optical business.
The agreement, valued at about $6 billion and running through 2030, will have Corning supplying optical fiber, cable, and connectivity gear for Meta’s data centers. Investors didn’t need much convincing. Corning shares jumped more than 16% on the news, and that move came just a day before the company reports Q4 earnings.
Morgan Stanley said the size of the deal alone makes it meaningful, especially with AI data center buildouts accelerating. Analyst Meta Marshall noted that while the agreement touches multiple parts of the data center stack, it’s mostly about scale-out expansion. As power constraints tighten, getting fiber closer to compute becomes critical, and optical solutions are increasingly the only way to support the density and scale AI workloads demand.
The customer mix shift also matters. Meta isn’t Corning’s largest AI customer today, but Marshall said this deal would make it the biggest. Corning’s optical segment already makes up about 40% of total revenue, and Morgan Stanley sees that share growing as AI infrastructure spending ramps.
