Corning (GLW) FY2025 results: revenue $15.6 billion, up 19.1% on the year

Corning traces its origins to a glass business established in 1851, was incorporated in New York in December 1936 and took its present name in April 1989. It works in glass science, ceramic science and optical physics, and its markets include optical communications, display, mobile consumer electronics, automotive, life sciences, semiconductors and solar power. It manufactures in 14 countries and reports five segments: Optical Communications, Display, Specialty Materials, Automotive and Life Sciences. From 1 January 2025 the Automotive Glass Solutions business has been managed with Environmental Technologies as the Automotive segment, and Display Technologies was renamed Display.

Optical Communications

The company invented the first low-loss optical fibre in 1970, and the segment splits into carrier network products, meaning communications infrastructure for video, data and voice, and enterprise network products sold to businesses, governments and individuals for their own use. The fibre range includes Vascade for submarine networks, LEAF for long-haul, regional and metropolitan networks, SMF-28e ULL and TXF for more scalable long-haul networks, SMF-28e+ single-mode fibre for extra wavelengths in metropolitan and access networks, and ClearCurve ultra-bendable fibre for multiple-dwelling units and fibre to the home. Part of the fibre is sold directly to end users and third-party cablers, and the rest is cabled internally and sold as bulk cable or inside an integrated system, with cable products including the RocketRibbon and miniXtend ranges. Principal competitors are Amphenol, Fujikura and its subsidiary America Fujikura, Sumitomo and Prysmian.

Display

The segment makes glass substrates for flat panel displays, both liquid crystal and organic light-emitting diode, used mainly in televisions, notebooks, monitors, tablets and handheld devices. It uses a proprietary fusion process the company invented, highly automated, which yields substrates with a pristine surface, thermal stability and dimensional uniformity, and which it calls the most cost-effective way to produce large substrates. Products include EAGLE XG Slim Glass, which the company calls its flagship display glass, for thinner televisions and monitors with larger screens, Astra Glass optimised for oxide thin-film transistor backplanes, and Lotus NXT Glass.

Specialty Materials and Automotive

Specialty Materials supplies more than 150 material formulations across glass, glass ceramics and crystals, plus precision optics, components, metrology instruments and software, into mobile consumer electronics, semiconductor equipment optics, aerospace and defence optics, radiation shielding, sunglasses and telecommunications components. Its best known product is Gorilla Glass, a chemically strengthened thin glass used as cover or back-enclosure glass on phones, tablets, laptops and smartwatches, with Victus 2 introduced in 2022 for better drop performance on rough surfaces. Automotive makes ceramic substrates and filters for emissions control plus technical glass and optics for vehicle interiors and exteriors. The cellular ceramic substrate it developed in the early 1970s became the standard for catalytic converters, and newer products include low-mass FLORA substrates and DuraTrap GC gasoline particulate filters, sold to catalyzers and emission control system makers whose own customers are vehicle and engine manufacturers.

Life Sciences, Hemlock and the rest

Life Sciences supplies laboratory products to researchers and drug manufacturers, working in materials science, polymer surface science, cell culture and cell biology across small molecule drugs, biologics, vaccines and cell and gene therapies. Its products are consumables such as plastic vessels, liquid handling plastics, specialty surfaces, cell culture media and serum, plus labware, glassware and equipment, sold under the Corning, Falcon, PYREX and Axygen brands, mainly through distributors to drug and biotechnology companies, contract manufacturers, testing labs, academic institutions, hospitals and government bodies. Businesses too small to report separately are grouped as Hemlock and Emerging Growth Businesses, mostly Hemlock Semiconductor Group, a provider of high-purity polysilicon for the solar and electronics industries, alongside businesses turning polysilicon into solar wafers and modules, a pharmaceutical technologies business making glass tubing and vials, and an emerging innovations group. That grouping was 9% of total segment net sales in 2025.

Inputs, competition and people

Manufacturing requires uninterrupted power, large quantities of industrial water, precious metals and various batch materials, and the company reports that supplies of ores, minerals, polymers, lithium, helium and processed chemicals appear adequate, with alternate suppliers for many of them. Competitors are many large and varied manufacturers at home and abroad, some larger and some with broader lines, and the company rests its position on research, customer relationships, reliability of supply, product quality, service and technical specification. It has approximately 67,200 full and part-time employees in 44 countries, approximately 68% in production and maintenance roles and more than 66% represented by a union, works council or other group.

From Corning's annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended 31 December 2025. The filing

Written from the 10-K filed 12 February 2026: read the full 10-K.