Fiber Connectivity Equipment Shifts Growth Focus to Data Centers

Broadband fiber suppliers are shifting their growth to data center construction. Between late July and early November 2026, conduit maker Orbia Advance (MXCHF) and fiber management equipment maker Clearfield (CLFD) said on their earnings calls that their main growth now comes from hyperscale cloud providers building data centers, not from the fiber-to-the-home and community broadband markets they grew up in [1][2][3]. Orbia's Connectivity Solutions revenue rose 47% year over year in the third quarter, and Clearfield expects about $40 million of data center shipments in fiscal 2027 [1][3].

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Broadband conduit and fiber hardware move onto data center campuses

Both companies sell the less visible parts of a fiber network. Orbia's Connectivity Solutions business, under the Dura-Line brand, makes buried plastic conduit that protects fiber and power cables. Clearfield makes fiber management equipment: the cabinets and panels that distribute, splice and organize large numbers of fibers. These products were mainly sold to telecom carriers and community broadband providers to run fiber all the way into homes, known as fiber-to-the-home [2][3].

AI data centers create a new use for the same products. A large campus needs extensive fiber and power pathways between buildings, and data center hubs in different cities need interconnection routes. Orbia said it supplies on-campus pathway solutions for fiber and power to all major hyperscalers, the large cloud providers that build their own data centers, as well as interconnection lines between data center hubs, and that both are growing at double-digit rates [2]. Clearfield's first data center order, about $22 million, covers one building on a very large campus; the company works directly with the end user and is training the contractors building the site [3].

The shift can spread across similar suppliers because the first building becomes a reference. Clearfield's management said this customer's validation positions it as a fiber management supplier for data centers and should help it win other customers in its pipeline [3].

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Data centers now make up 10% to 20% of the relevant revenue

Orbia's numbers show the growth accelerating across two quarters. In the second quarter, Connectivity Solutions revenue was $319 million, up 30% year over year, and management said data centers already made up 15% to 20% of the segment's revenue [2]. In the third quarter, revenue rose to $373 million, up 47%, with an EBITDA margin (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization as a share of revenue) of 19.1%, up 234 basis points [1]. Orbia attributes demand to both telecom providers and hyperscalers, and part of the growth also comes from telecom network upgrades and US power grid modernization [1].

Clearfield gave a full-year outlook. It expects fiscal 2027 revenue of $195 million to $205 million, 30% growth at the midpoint, supported by a gradual recovery in broadband demand and the ramp of its data center business [3]. In management's split, about $160 million comes from broadband growing at single-digit rates and about $40 million from data centers [3]. Taken together, data centers already account for 10% to 20% of the relevant business at both companies, while Clearfield's legacy broadband business grows only in the single digits.

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Hyperscalers now qualify suppliers, and margins diverge

The party that decides who can supply is moving from telecom carriers to hyperscalers and their engineering contractors. In broadband, this hardware was ordered on carriers' network build plans. On data center projects, Clearfield deals directly with the end user and trains contractors on its products, and winning the remaining buildings on the same campus depends on how the first building is received [3]. Orders may therefore concentrate on a few large customers and projects.

Greater scale has not improved profits at both companies. At Orbia, changes in mix and higher utilization lifted segment margin [1]. At Clearfield, ramp costs for the data center business and data-center-driven inflation in fiber and sheet metal are diluting gross margin in the near term [3].

The conclusion has clear limits. Clearfield's data center business rests on one disclosed customer, so whether the roughly $40 million materializes depends on that customer's next buildings and on new customers in the pipeline [3]. Two checks follow: whether Clearfield wins follow-on orders on the same campus or a second data center customer, and whether Orbia's data center share rises above 15% to 20% [2][3].

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Companies exposed to the shift

• Dycom Industries (DY): The US telecom engineering contractor builds fiber-to-the-home and long-haul routes, and its contracted long-haul and data center interconnect backlog from hyperscalers exceeds $1 billion, the kind of routes Orbia's interconnection conduit serves; but its fiber-to-the-home business still grew about 60% in the first half, so the idea that data centers are replacing broadband may not apply to it [4].
• Corning (GLW): Corning makes optical fiber and connectivity products, and Drillr's company relationship data lists it as a Clearfield competitor [5]; as broadband-heritage suppliers win hyperscaler qualification, data center fiber management gains more suppliers, but there is no evidence yet on whether this affects Corning's share.

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Sources

[1] Drillr · Orbia Advance (MXCHF) · 2026-10-28 · Earnings call

[2] Drillr · Orbia Advance (MXCHF) · 2026-07-23 · Earnings call

[3] Drillr · Clearfield (CLFD) · 2026-11-10 · Earnings call

And so we believe not only do we have an opportunity to scale with this customer, but to use the validation that this customer provides, that Clearfield is a fiber management player for data centers and not a broadband player trying to enter the data center market.

[4] Drillr · Dycom Industries (DY) · 2026-08-26 · Earnings call

[5] Drillr · Clearfield (CLFD) · 2026-11-10 · Company relationship data

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