The Black Box

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Corning to Present at Florida Investor Conference
Company will reaffirm quarterly guidance
CORNING, N.Y., March 8, 2004 - Corning Incorporated’s (NYSE:GLW) Vice Chairman and Chief Financial Officer, James B. Flaws, will discuss the company's growth opportunities in liquid crystal display (LCD) glass, fiber to the premises and diesel substrates during the Deutsche Bank Information Technology Hardware Conference at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in South Beach, Florida, today.

During the discussion, Flaws will also reaffirm the company's 2004 first-quarter revenue guidance in the range of $770 million to $830 million, with earnings per share in the range of $0.04 to $0.05, before special items. "We are two months into the quarter and I am pleased to say that we are on track to meet our original guidance for revenues and earnings per share," Flaws will say.

Flaws will also tell investors that the company is experiencing stronger than expected demand for LCD glass products during the first quarter and it is updating guidance for these products. Corning will say that it now expects sequential volume growth of LCD glass to be more than 10 percent in the first quarter, versus its previous guidance of 5 percent to 10 percent. The company still expects LCD pricing in the first quarter to remain stable.

Corning's proprietary and scalable fusion technology enables the company to supply the growing number of customers installing fifth and sixth generation LCD fabrication lines. Corning was the first to introduce a Gen 5 substrate and, in June 2003, became the first commercial supplier of Gen 6 substrates. Further, Corning is developing Gen 7 capability and expects it will reach the market in the second half of 2004.

Flaws will also say that the company is seeing slightly weaker optical fiber volume in North America and now expects first quarter volume to decline sequentially by 10 percent to 15 percent. It had previously said that optical fiber volume would be stable to down 5 percent. "While we are getting off to a slower start than expected in fiber, we still expect optical fiber volume for the full year to be stable with last year," Flaws will say. "The good news here is that fiber pricing continues to moderate and is within our original expectations for the quarter."