A Look Back at Data Infrastructure Stocks’ Q1 Earnings: Confluent (NASDAQ:CFLT) Vs The Rest Of The Pack

Quarterly earnings results are a good time to check in on a company’s progress, especially compared to its peers in the same sector. Today we are looking at Confluent (NASDAQ:CFLT) and the best and worst performers in the data infrastructure industry.

Generating insights from system level data is an increasing priority for most businesses, but to do so requires connecting and analyzing piles of data stored and siloed in separate databases. This is the demand driver for cloud based data infrastructure software providers, who can more readily integrate, distribute and process information vs. legacy on-premise software providers.

The 4 data infrastructure stocks we track reported a mixed Q1; on average, revenues beat analyst consensus estimates by 1.7%. while next quarter’s revenue guidance was in line with consensus. Stocks–especially those trading at higher multiples–had a strong end of 2023, but 2024 has seen periods of volatility. Mixed signals about inflation have led to uncertainty around rate cuts, but data infrastructure stocks have performed well, with the share prices up 10.5% on average since the previous earnings results.

Confluent (NASDAQ:CFLT)

Started in 2014 by the team of engineers at LinkedIn who originally built it as an internal tool, Confluent (NASDAQ:CFLT) provides infrastructure software for organizations that makes it easy and fast to collect and move large amounts of data between different systems.

Confluent reported revenues of $217.2 million, up 24.6% year on year, exceeding analysts’ expectations by 2.5%. Overall, it was a mixed quarter for the company with full-year revenue guidance topping analysts’ expectations but decelerating growth in large customers.

“Confluent started fiscal year 2024 strong, highlighted by 45% year-over-year revenue growth for Confluent Cloud, which now accounts for the majority of our subscription revenue and remains our fastest growing offering,” said Jay Kreps, co-founder and CEO, Confluent.

Confluent scored the fastest revenue growth of the whole group. The company added 31 enterprise customers paying more than $100,000 annually to reach a total of 1,260. The stock is down 4.1% since reporting and currently trades at $26.71.

Is now the time to buy Confluent? Access our full analysis of the earnings results here, it’s free.

Best Q1: Elastic (NYSE:ESTC)

Started by Shay Banon as a search engine for his wife’s growing list of recipes at Le Cordon Bleu cooking school in Paris, Elastic (NYSE:ESTC) helps companies integrate search into their products and monitor their cloud infrastructure.

Story continues

Elastic reported revenues of $335 million, up 19.7% year on year, outperforming analysts’ expectations by 1.6%. It was a solid quarter for the company with an impressive beat of analysts’ billings estimates and accelerating customer growth.

The market seems happy with the results as the stock is up 27.7% since reporting. It currently trades at $119.

Is now the time to buy Elastic? Access our full analysis of the earnings results here, it’s free.

Weakest Q1: Teradata (NYSE:TDC)

Part of point-of-sale and ATM company NCR from 1991 to 2007, Teradata (NYSE:TDC) offers a software-as-service platform that helps organizations manage their data across multiple storages and analyze it.

Teradata reported revenues of $465 million, down 2.3% year on year, in line with analysts’ expectations. It was a weak quarter for the company with a miss of analysts’ billings estimates.

Teradata had the weakest performance against analyst estimates and slowest revenue growth in the group. As expected, the stock is down 10.4% since the results and currently trades at $34.

Read our full analysis of Teradata’s results here.

C3.ai (NYSE:AI)

Founded in 2009 by enterprise software veteran Tom Seibel, C3.ai (NYSE:AI) provides software that makes it easy for organizations to add artificial intelligence technology to their applications.

C3.ai reported revenues of $86.59 million, up 19.6% year on year, surpassing analysts’ expectations by 2.6%. Revenue aside, it was an ok quarter for the company with management forecasting accelerating growth but a miss of analysts’ billings estimates.

C3.ai delivered the biggest analyst estimates beat and highest full-year guidance raise among its peers. The stock is up 28.6% since reporting and currently trades at $30.78.

Read our full, actionable report on C3.ai here, it’s free.

Join Paid Stock Investor Research

Help us make StockStory more helpful to investors like yourself. Join our paid user research session and receive a $50 Amazon gift card for your opinions. Sign up here.