Corning Inc (NYSE:GLW, ETR:GLW) climbed over 10% after the Gorilla Glass and optical fiber maker said that earnings and sales returned to growth in the last quarter, due to demand linked to the artificial intelligence trend.
Management now expects $3.3 billion of second-quarter core sales, compared with previous guidance of $3.4 billion, with this outperformance primarily driven by strong adoption of new optical fibre connectivity products for generative AI.
Core earnings per share are now expected to be at the high end of or slightly above management’s prior guided range of $0.42-0.46.
Wendell Weeks, chairman and chief executive officer, said: "The outperformance was primarily driven by the strong adoption of our new optical connectivity products for Generative AI."
He said these results reinforce the board's confidence in its Springboard plan to add more than $3 billion in annualized sales in the next three years, helped by a combination of cyclical factors and secular trends.
As Corning captures this growth, management expects to deliver "powerful incremental profit and cash flow", with the required production capacity and technical capabilities already in place.
Weeks said: "Because of our confidence in Springboard, we began buying back our shares in the second quarter."
Full second-quarter results are due on July 30.