Corning, the 175-year-old New York manufacturer best known for kitchenware and smartphone glass, is scaling up production of optical fibre to meet surging demand from the artificial intelligence boom. Data centres require vast networks of high-speed optical fibre to connect servers, and Corning's chief executive Wendell Weeks says this demand is driving the company's fastest growth period in almost two centuries, with the firm on course to roughly double in size and hire heavily into American manufacturing roles.

Corning is partnering with Nvidia to build three advanced optical-manufacturing facilities in North Carolina and Texas, a project expected to create more than 3,000 jobs and expand the company's US optical-manufacturing capacity tenfold. Weeks argues AI is proving to be a major job creator rather than a threat to employment, while staff at Corning's Wilmington, North Carolina plant say they are seeing first-hand how AI demand is driving orders for the glass fibre that connects the chips powering data centres.