Gorilla glass maker Corning doubles down on India, eyes semiconductor, aerospace & defence industries

Corning Gorilla Glass

US-based Corning, the maker of Gorilla Glass, is doubling down on its India push by setting up a smartphone manufacturing unit in Chennai and a pharmaceuticals facility in Hyderabad.

India managing director Sudhir Pillai told Moneycontrol that the specialty glass company also wants to participate in the country's semiconductor, aerospace, and defence industries as more customers move base or join the ecosystem to start creating local supply chains.

“Because we are a cornerstone component manufacturer, we have a disciplined approach to growth, which means we follow our customers and ecosystem. That’s how we think about growth and expansion in India,” Pillai said.

“Our customers and ecosystems have come to India in the last four years. Hence, we are following them and helping them make products in India.”

Corning, whose glass products are used in phones by Apple and Samsung among others, is also in talks with companies in the semiconductor industry to provide glass for lasers, direction systems and packaging.

“My current priority is to ensure all manufacturing facilities we have an investment in India start manufacturing products with 100 percent of the capacity utilised,” he said.

Corning will begin production of cover glasses for mobile phones by the second half of 2025 from its new facility in Chennai. From the first half of the next year, it will also start making glass tubes and vials to store vaccines at its plant, which is coming up in Hyderabad.

Bharat Innovative Glass Technologies Pvt will carry out the production, a joint venture formed early this year between Corning and Indian electronics manufacturing services provider Optiemus Infracom. The company is investing $100 million in the first phase of construction of the facility, which held a ground-breaking ceremony in June.

“In the display ecosystem, we are following customers,” Pillai said.

The Hyderabad factory is being set up in a joint venture between Corning and France’s SGD Pharma with an initial investment of $60 million.

The American glassmaker is also tracking the aerospace and defence industry, which is seeing widespread localisation. The aerospace, defence, and drone industries require high-purity fused silica, one of the glasses Corning produces.

“If there is a more Atmanirbhar-related action in the aerospace defence segment, we would also like to follow. Today, more and more semicon-related developments are taking place in India. We enable the semicon industry and will follow the ecosystem,” Pillai said referring to the government’s push for self-reliance.

Pillai said that the Tamil Nadu plant will have an initial capacity of 35 million pieces, which will cater to all the local players and global vendors assembling in India.

The company also has a fibre optic cable manufacturing unit in Pune. Asked if Corning's demand has fallen due to the global slowdown, Pillai said, “The optical fibre business is a very cyclical business globally. So, we follow that, and whatever happens cyclically, we go through that but the plants are running and part of the global supply chain.”

In May, Corning started a global capability centre (GCC) in Pune to build IT capability and make its supply chain and manufacturing more resilient. “There will be a lot of systems and processes that will be used globally. We are hiring 100 people for this.”

A GCC is a dedicated offshore unit a company sets up in a foreign country to in-source information technology and related business functions.