The Poland factory of YOFC based in the Wuhan East Lake High-tech Development Zone (also known as Optics Valley of China, or OVC) began construction in March 2021, producing its first qualified outdoor optical cable in February 2022 and reaching full design capacity in October 2022. As China's earliest joint venture enterprise for optical fibers, YOFC, after the efforts of nearly 30 years, has become the world's largest supplier for optical fibre preforms and optical fibers as well as the world's second largest supplier for optical cables. In the 1960s, Kao created various methods to combine glass fibres with lasers in order to transmit digital data. In 1993, a young Zhou Qunfei mortgaged her life savings to rent a three-bedroom apartment in Shenzhen, transforming it into a workshop for watch glass printing. Three decades later, her journey, and that of millions like hers, epitomizes China's industrial metamorphosis from low-cost assembly to an. Although this concept was first discovered in 1870 by John Tyndall, an English physicist, the first practical use occurred in 1955, when Indian scientist Narinder S. Sumitomo Electric Industries, Ltd. As of November 2025, China's fiber optic market is valued at over USD 10 billion, accounting for more than 50% of global.