HICKORY — In Catawba County the cable comes first. The data centers come after.
Corning Optical Communications makes optical cable at plants in Hickory and Newton. Charlotte is home to the business unit’s headquarters. The company says it employs more than 5,000 people in North Carolina. On March 31 it broke ground on a Hickory expansion at Trivium Corporate Center so Meta can buy more of that cable for AI data centers. Microsoft, separately, is building data centers of its own in Conover, Hickory, Maiden, and Newton. This week Corning announced another multiyear, multibillion-dollar fiber deal — this one with Verizon — for broadband and AI infrastructure nationwide.
The pattern is the same. Corning builds the cable. Meta and Microsoft build the demand.
Meta’s order, Hickory’s plant
Meta is the local piece. Under a multiyear agreement of up to $6 billion announced earlier this year, Corning will supply Meta with optical fiber, cable, and connectivity. Meta is the anchor customer for the Hickory expansion. The plant will make optical cable that Meta says is critical to AI infrastructure, and Corning says the expansion could raise its North Carolina employment by 15 to 20 percent.
“Today we are breaking ground on a new state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in a critical next step for strengthening the domestic supply chain for AI data centers,” Hal Nelson, Corning’s chief operating officer, said at the March groundbreaking. Mike O’Day, senior vice president and general manager of Corning Optical Communications, told reporters the company planned to hire well over 130 people for the expansion, from engineers and technicians to people who make cable. Corning has said the Hickory site is on track to become the world’s largest optical cable plant.
Dan Sachs, Meta’s vice president of public policy for state and local, framed the deal as domestic manufacturing and North Carolina jobs. “Our partnership with Corning supports our goal of strengthening domestic manufacturing, supporting good jobs in North Carolina, and building a foundation for the next era of American innovation,” he said.
That is the Meta half of the demand. It is a purchase order tied to a factory in Hickory, not a claim that every Meta data center sits in Catawba County.
Microsoft’s campuses, next door
Microsoft’s half is on the ground here. In 2022 the company said it would invest at least $1 billion over ten years in four data centers in Catawba County — Conover, Hickory, Maiden, and Newton — and create at least 50 jobs. Construction slowed in 2025. County and local reporting later showed building permits and a restart of work toward a 2032 completion window. Conover has published a joint statement on the campuses, taxes, and water. CVCC’s foundation has taken a Microsoft grant for a Valley Datacenter Academy. Earlier coverage: Conover’s joint statement on Microsoft data centers, taxes, and water and CVCC Foundation’s $50,000 Microsoft grant for the Valley Datacenter Academy.
Those campuses are Microsoft’s demand for power, land, and fiber. They are not the same contract as Meta’s order at Corning. They are the other side of the same county map: one company expanding a cable plant for AI, another pouring slabs for data halls.
Verizon’s deal, same product
On Sept. 8, Corning and Verizon announced a multiyear, multibillion-dollar supply agreement for more than 80 million miles of high-density optical fiber and connectivity solutions from 2027 through 2032. Verizon says the fiber will expand consumer broadband and build long-haul corridors that connect data centers for AI hyperscalers. O’Day, the same Corning executive who spoke in Hickory in March, said the partnership shows that generative AI and broadband expansion are “part of the same transformative opportunity,” and that Corning manufactures those innovations “at scale here in the United States.”
The Verizon release does not name Hickory, Newton, or Catawba County. It is a national buy. The local reading is narrower and cleaner: Catawba County is where Corning already turns that kind of product into payroll.
Claremont has its own cable story. Catawba First News has reported on Prysmian’s planned billion-dollar expansion there: Claremont and Catawba County weigh up to $56 million in incentives for Prysmian’s $1 billion expansion. Different company. Same industry pressure.
What the county is selling
Put together, the week’s news and the spring groundbreaking tell one county story. Corning makes optical cable in Hickory and Newton. Meta has signed up as the anchor buyer for more of it. Microsoft is building data centers in four Catawba County cities. Verizon has just locked in years of Corning fiber for broadband and AI backbones. The revolution language belongs to the press releases. The local fact is simpler.
Corning builds the cable. Meta and Microsoft build the demand.
