- Corning landed a $3B-plus fiber supply deal with AT&T as the operator races to double its U.S. fiber footprint by 2030
- The deal adds to Corning’s run of mega fiber wins with operators and hyperscalers
- AT&T plans its biggest fiber build year yet in 2026, with 8 million new locations including newly acquired Lumen assets
Corning hooked another big fish, inking a more than $3 billion fiber supply deal with AT&T. The deal comes as AT&T accelerates its fiber broadband expansion in the U.S., looking to double its footprint from 30 million passings to 60 million by 2030.
“Corning and AT&T have worked side by side for generations to connect people across this country, and this agreement is the next chapter in that partnership,” Corning CEO Wendell Weeks said in a statement.
The agreement is the latest big win for Corning, which also recently signed multi-billion-dollar fiber supply deals with Verizon, Zayo, Amazon, Microsoft and Meta. To support this growing demand for fiber, Corning in May announced plans to build three new optical manufacturing plants in North Carolina and Texas.
During Q2 2026 earnings in July, Weeks said Corning expects to exit 2026 with a $20 billion annualized sales run rate, and is aiming to boost that figure to $30 billion by 2028 and $40 billion by the end of 2030.
Of the carrier market specifically, CFO Ed Schlesinger said “Carrier sales grew 1% year-over-year in the second quarter. Longer term, in carrier, we expect to grow sales mid-single digits, driven by fiber-to-the-home deployments and data center interconnect.”
AT&T’s expansion plans
Indeed, AT&T has put the pedal to the metal on its fiber-to-the-home build over the past year and especially in light of its recent acquisition of assets from Lumen.
In July 2025, the operator said it would accelerate its fiber expansion by an extra 1 million passings per year starting in 2026, for a total of 4 million.
“It will be our largest year ever for fiber expansion, with plans to reach 8 million new locations including over 4 million locations acquired from Lumen,” CEO John Stankey said during Q2 2026 earnings.
Stankey previously stated that the operator is looking to move even faster in 2027 and beyond, targeting 5 million new locations annually.
Read more about Corning on Fierce Network:
Verizon signs $2 billion-plus deal with Corning to supply fiber for FTTP and AI
Corning expects an annualized revenue run rate of $20B for 2026
Amazon and Corning announce multi-billion-dollar deal for fiber supply
Corning to build 3 new plants in the U.S. with help from Nvidia