In a nutshell: Nvidia has signed a multi-year agreement with Corning to help the glass specialist expand its optical technology manufacturing capabilities in the US. Under the agreement, Corning will build three new production facilities in Texas and North Carolina to help usher in the next generation of AI infrastructure.

Nvidia said the deal will expand Corning's US-based optical connectivity manufacturing capacity tenfold and boost its domestic fiber production capacity by more than 50%. Collectively, the new facilities will create north of 3,000 high-paying jobs, we are told. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed, nor was a timeline for constructing and bringing the new factories online.

The chipmaker said modern AI workloads require thousands of Nvidia GPU which in turn, need "unprecedented volumes" of high-performance optical fiber and supporting hardware to move data with speed at scale. As more AI centers come online, the need for additional fiber optics is only going to grow.

Corning, as you may know, is a leader in glass manufacturing. The company became a household name in the tech community after Apple co-founder Steve Jobs famously leveraged the company's hardened glass to protect the display of the original iPhone. Today, Corning's Gorilla Glass is the cover glass of choice for most major smartphone makers.

Corning's stock is up nearly 15 % on the news, while Nvidia's is up more than 4 %. The bump has pushed share value in Corning to a new all-time high, currently at $186.29 per share as of this writing. Year to date, Corning's stock is up 104 % and Nvidia's is up about 8 %.

This is not the first major partnership for Corning this year. Back in January, Meta inked a multi-year agreement with the glass maker worth up to $6 billion. That deal included the construction of a new manufacturing plant in Hickory, North Carolina, and a production capacity boost at existing facilities in the state. Together, the expansion is expected to grow Corning's workforce in North Carolina by up to 20%.