Corning CCO Li Hanchao: After 175 Years, Corning Remains an Innovative Materials Company
At DIC Expo 2026, Corning CCO Li Hanchao discussed the company's 175-year history, its deep ties with China's display industry, and its role in AI-era materials innovation.
In an interview with ifanr, Li Hanchao, chief commercial officer of Corning Display Technologies China, said Corning's strategy in China is to "take root in China, invest in China, and give back to China." Corning has built most of its 8.5-generation and 10.5-generation glass substrate facilities in China, along with production bases for automotive applications, consumer electronics cover glass, optical communications, and life sciences.
Li noted that Corning's display business entered China 21 years ago, with its first major investment in Beijing supporting BOE's glass substrate local production. Over the years, Corning has established deep cooperation with almost every major Chinese panel maker, contributing to the growth of China's display industry.
Li highlighted a curved display jointly developed with BOE as an example of innovation driven by Chinese customers. The display uses two pieces of 0.38mm ultra-thin Corning glass substrates, which help improve yield in curved panel production. After the product launched, many industry players followed suit, raising the industry standard.
Regarding AI's impact on displays, Li said screens are evolving in two major trends. First, display form factors continue to diversify, from TVs to computers, phones, car screens, and wearables like AI glasses. Second, screens are becoming interactive windows rather than just output devices, with more sensors for voice, eye tracking, and gesture control. These trends place higher demands on materials' optical performance, manufacturing precision, and integration capability.
Li emphasized that Corning has been deeply involved in semiconductor and optical communications technologies long before the current AI boom. The company supplied fused quartz materials to IBM for supercomputers years ago. At the DIC Expo, Corning displayed glass core substrates with through-glass vias (TGVs) for advanced chip packaging, which offer higher interconnect density and thermal-mechanical stability than traditional organic substrates.
Asked about the strategic cooperation memorandum signed with BOE in May, Li said the four major directions are glass-based packaging, bendable glass, perovskite glass, and optical interconnect materials. The partnership aims to promote the scaled and practical application of frontier technologies through industry chain collaboration.
Li stressed that Corning avoids the word "replacement." New technologies usually create incremental markets rather than completely replacing old ones. For advanced packaging, glass substrates offer advantages in thermal stability, surface quality, and design flexibility, and Corning is working with domestic partners on technical validation and ecosystem cooperation.
Reflecting on Corning's 175-year journey, Li said technology, industries, and applications have changed, but Corning's continuous investment in material innovation remains unchanged. "Innovation is never a single company's effort," he said, "but the result of the entire industry chain investing and pushing forward together."