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Will ActiveScale Growth Accelerate Quantum's AI Storage Business?
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Key Takeaways
QMCO says ActiveScale revenue tripled year over year on AI and large-scale data management demand.
Quantum sees growing interest in tiered storage as customers seek lower cost and power consumption.
QMCO expects first-quarter fiscal 2027 net sales of $75 million, plus or minus $2 million.
Quantum Corporation (QMCO - Free Report) is benefiting from rising demand for AI-driven storage as organizations manage rapidly expanding data volumes while facing higher primary storage costs, power constraints and supply chain challenges. Customers across AI, high-performance computing (HPC) and research are looking for cost-effective ways to store and manage data at scale. To address these requirements, Quantum offers an integrated portfolio that includes Scalar, DXi, ActiveScale and StorNext, enabling customers to balance high-performance storage with long-term, lower-cost storage in a unified approach. The company believes this combination helps customers manage the right data for the right workload at the right cost while supporting both performance and affordability.
ActiveScale has emerged as one of the company's strongest growth drivers, with revenue from the object storage platform tripling year over year due to increasing adoption for large-scale data management and AI workloads. Quantum stated that demand for its ActiveScale cold storage solution continues to increase because of its capabilities and performance. More customers are also shifting data from primary storage to tiered storage architectures, driving additional interest in object storage and tape-based solutions where cost efficiency and power consumption are important considerations.
The company highlighted a partnership with Pink Elephant, a sovereign managed service provider in Europe, where ActiveScale demonstrated resilience by maintaining uninterrupted services after a fire at one of the provider's data centers. Quantum also secured a major deployment with a global sports network that will use ActiveScale cold storage integrated with tape libraries to host its complete content archive, while existing customers continue expanding deployments toward hundreds of petabytes and eventually exabyte-scale environments.
On the last earnings call, management highlighted that ActiveScale combines flash, disk and tape technologies, allowing customers to achieve high-performance data ingestion, cataloging and retrieval while benefiting from the lower cost and reduced power consumption of tape storage. The company said this combination has been a key contributor to ActiveScale's growth and continues to gain momentum across AI, HPC, media and entertainment, genomics and medical research, as well as other data-intensive industries.
Quantum highlighted that ActiveScale has accelerated for several quarters and continues to experience strong demand for its cold storage offerings, supported by organizations seeking scalable storage solutions for AI and other data-intensive workloads. For first-quarter fiscal 2027, Quantum anticipates net sales to be $75 million (+/-$2 million).
Taking a Look at QMCO’s Competitors
Western Digital Corporation (WDC - Free Report) is gaining from strength across end markets, riding on AI-led storage needs and multi-year agreements extending through 2028-29. The cloud end market accounts for the lion’s share of its sales, fueled by strong demand for high-capacity nearline drives and favorable pricing. Higher-capacity drives and solid UltraSMR uptake that improved customer TCO are aiding margins, while strong operating leverage, lower interest costs and tax efficiency are fueling EPS growth. Western Digital is advancing areal density and boosting performance with high-bandwidth drives. For the fourth-quarter fiscal 2026, the company expects revenue of $3.65 billion (+/- $100 million), implying about 40% year-over-year growth at the midpoint.
NetApp, Inc. (NTAP - Free Report) is benefiting from rising enterprise demand for modern all-flash storage and hybrid cloud data management as customers scale AI workloads. Fourth-quarter fiscal 2026 results showed continued growth in all-flash, Public Cloud services and Keystone, supported by deeper hyperscaler partnerships and a larger services backlog. For fiscal 2027, management expects revenue growth to accelerate, and plans to continue returning capital to shareholders, including returning up to all free cash flow, while also investing in AI-focused product refreshes. For fiscal 2027, NetApp projects net revenues in the range of $7.325 billion to $7.575 billion.
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Will ActiveScale Growth Accelerate Quantum's AI Storage Business?
Key Takeaways
Quantum Corporation (QMCO - Free Report) is benefiting from rising demand for AI-driven storage as organizations manage rapidly expanding data volumes while facing higher primary storage costs, power constraints and supply chain challenges. Customers across AI, high-performance computing (HPC) and research are looking for cost-effective ways to store and manage data at scale. To address these requirements, Quantum offers an integrated portfolio that includes Scalar, DXi, ActiveScale and StorNext, enabling customers to balance high-performance storage with long-term, lower-cost storage in a unified approach. The company believes this combination helps customers manage the right data for the right workload at the right cost while supporting both performance and affordability.
ActiveScale has emerged as one of the company's strongest growth drivers, with revenue from the object storage platform tripling year over year due to increasing adoption for large-scale data management and AI workloads. Quantum stated that demand for its ActiveScale cold storage solution continues to increase because of its capabilities and performance. More customers are also shifting data from primary storage to tiered storage architectures, driving additional interest in object storage and tape-based solutions where cost efficiency and power consumption are important considerations.
The company highlighted a partnership with Pink Elephant, a sovereign managed service provider in Europe, where ActiveScale demonstrated resilience by maintaining uninterrupted services after a fire at one of the provider's data centers. Quantum also secured a major deployment with a global sports network that will use ActiveScale cold storage integrated with tape libraries to host its complete content archive, while existing customers continue expanding deployments toward hundreds of petabytes and eventually exabyte-scale environments.
On the last earnings call, management highlighted that ActiveScale combines flash, disk and tape technologies, allowing customers to achieve high-performance data ingestion, cataloging and retrieval while benefiting from the lower cost and reduced power consumption of tape storage. The company said this combination has been a key contributor to ActiveScale's growth and continues to gain momentum across AI, HPC, media and entertainment, genomics and medical research, as well as other data-intensive industries.
Quantum highlighted that ActiveScale has accelerated for several quarters and continues to experience strong demand for its cold storage offerings, supported by organizations seeking scalable storage solutions for AI and other data-intensive workloads. For first-quarter fiscal 2027, Quantum anticipates net sales to be $75 million (+/-$2 million).
Taking a Look at QMCO’s Competitors
Western Digital Corporation (WDC - Free Report) is gaining from strength across end markets, riding on AI-led storage needs and multi-year agreements extending through 2028-29. The cloud end market accounts for the lion’s share of its sales, fueled by strong demand for high-capacity nearline drives and favorable pricing. Higher-capacity drives and solid UltraSMR uptake that improved customer TCO are aiding margins, while strong operating leverage, lower interest costs and tax efficiency are fueling EPS growth. Western Digital is advancing areal density and boosting performance with high-bandwidth drives. For the fourth-quarter fiscal 2026, the company expects revenue of $3.65 billion (+/- $100 million), implying about 40% year-over-year growth at the midpoint.
NetApp, Inc. (NTAP - Free Report) is benefiting from rising enterprise demand for modern all-flash storage and hybrid cloud data management as customers scale AI workloads. Fourth-quarter fiscal 2026 results showed continued growth in all-flash, Public Cloud services and Keystone, supported by deeper hyperscaler partnerships and a larger services backlog. For fiscal 2027, management expects revenue growth to accelerate, and plans to continue returning capital to shareholders, including returning up to all free cash flow, while also investing in AI-focused product refreshes. For fiscal 2027, NetApp projects net revenues in the range of $7.325 billion to $7.575 billion.
QMCO Price Performance, Valuation and Estimates
Shares of Quantum have gained 53.1% in the past three months compared with the Computer- Storage Devices industry’s growth of 29.3%.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
In terms of price/sales F12M, QMCO’s shares are trading at 1.32X, lower than the Internet Software Services industry’s 3.41X.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for QMCO’s earnings for 2026 has been revised significantly upward over the past 60 days.
Image Source: Zacks Investment Research
Quantum currently carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.