I still feel GLW is not as well known among those investors who are buying any company that has something to do with fibre optics. Those that do know were waiting for the sellers to give up their shares at sale prices all day and then just got impatient after the selling dried up. That could explain why we had such an incredible move in the last 1/2 hour.
I had no idea what Oak did until I heard of possible acquisitions for JDS Uniphase in a street.com article a few months ago.
Here is another story that was posted after the close of the market--talking about Cornings push into this business. This will probably be a business with few players in the future, at least in components business.
dailynews.yahoo.com
Thursday February 3 4:37 PM ET
Corning Focusing on Fiber Optics
By BEN DOBBIN Associated Press Writer
CORNING, N.Y. (AP) - Corning Inc (NYSE:GLW - news). is driving deeper into one of the scorching, high-tech businesses credited with enabling the phenomenal growth of the Internet: fiber optics.
The world's leading supplier of optical fiber and cable said Thursday it is investing about $750 million to expand its global fiber-making capacity by 50 percent within three years.
Driven by rapid technological innovation and plunging costs, the amount of information that fiber-optic systems can handle is estimated to be doubling every nine months.
``Compare that with Moore's Law, which has microprocessors doubling in capability every 18 months and ... you begin to get an idea of the scale of the experience change,' said Wendell Weeks, who oversees Corning's fiber and optical equipment businesses.
The ``scientific glass company,' famous for entwining glass innovations in potent technologies from the light bulb to television's cathode-ray tube, recently spent over $3 billion to solidify its presence in optical communications.
Corning wants to begin offering its customers ``one-stop shopping' by getting a bigger foothold in the optical equipment field - making the components that amplify and redirect the laser light pulses carrying information at hyper-speed through fiber-optic grids.
In November, Corning acquired a leading laser producer, Oak Industries Inc (NYSE:OAK - news)., in a stock deal valued at about $2 billion. A month later, it paid around $1.3 billion to buy Siemens AG's fiber-optic systems business and buy out two joint ventures with the German industrial group. Both deals were formally completed during the past week.
By investing in laser and other optical components, Corning is pushing into terrain reigned over by powerhouses like San Jose, Calif.-based JDS Uniphase Corp (NasdaqNM:JDSU - news). and Lucent Technologies of Murray Hill, N.J.
Corning, based in rural western New York, invented optical fiber in 1970. It already controls an estimated 40 percent of the world's optical fiber market, twice as much as its nearest rival, Lucent, and has fiber-making plants in Europe, Australia and the United States, including the world's biggest one in Wilmington, N.C.
Analysts set worldwide demand for fiber at more than 37 million miles in 1999. The market is expected to exceed 60 million miles in 2002.
Corning is investing $550 million to double the capacity of its six-month-old factory near Concord, N.C., and add 500 jobs to several hundred already there. It also is planning a $100 million expansion at the Wilmington plant.
Optical fiber, cable and optical devices contributed 59 percent of Corning's revenues of $4.3 billion in 1999, and that segment will likely account for 70 percent of sales this year.
Shares of Corning were up $1.25 to $149.50 in trading on the New York Stock Exchange. |
