CrowdStrike Beats Q2 Estimates on Record ARR and Falcon Flex Growth

CrowdStrike Holdings has listed its Falcon cybersecurity platform in the OpenAI Marketplace for enterprise buyers. The arrangement allows eligible OpenAI enterprise customers to use a portion of their existing OpenAI commitments to procure Falcon, tying the platform to the same budgets used for frontier models and agents. The partnership links CrowdStrike's AI-driven security tools with OpenAI agentic technologies and associated procurement workflows for joint clients, with a launch set for September 2026. The move follows recent integrations from Tamnoon and Salt Security that plug Falcon into cloud remediation, API security and AI agent monitoring. The clearest test of whether the listing moves the needle will be whether management breaks out Marketplace-driven wins, such as the share of new Falcon commitments sourced from OpenAI or growth in joint enterprise customers.

TrendAI, the AI security business unit of Trend Micro Incorporated, announced it has expanded support for Claude's Compliance API in TrendAI Vision One to cover Claude Code and Cowork session transcripts from Claude Enterprise. The move builds on the integration TrendAI announced with Anthropic in June 2026 and adds visibility into how engineering and knowledge-work teams use AI agents day to day. Claude's Compliance API returns session records for Claude Code and Cowork, including prompts, responses and tool calls, each tied to a verified user, and TrendAI now brings those records into TrendAI Vision One so security teams can investigate AI activity in context, correlate it with endpoint, identity, cloud and network signals, and build custom detections. Rachel Jin, Chief Platform and Business Officer and Head of TrendAI, said coding and knowledge-work agents are now doing real work inside the business and security teams should be able to see and investigate that work the same way they do everything else. TrendAI Vision One also continues to ingest activity logs from Claude Enterprise, covering user logins, admin actions and configuration changes, and from Claude Platform, covering admin, system and resource events. The Claude Compliance API integration in TrendAI Vision One is available now for TrendAI Vision One customers using Claude Enterprise.

The U.S. Department of Justice concluded its examination into CrowdStrike Holdings regarding its transaction practices with distributors, including a heavily scrutinized $32 million arrangement with Carahsoft, without pursuing any civil or criminal enforcement. Federal prosecutors notified involved parties that the inquiry was finished with no charges filed. The resolution came as CrowdStrike reported second-quarter fiscal 2027 results, with total revenue up 26% year-over-year to $1.47 billion and annual recurring revenue reaching $5.84 billion. The company generated a record $333 million in net new ARR and raised its full-year net new ARR growth outlook to 34% at the midpoint, while accounts adopting Falcon Flex exceeded $2.29 billion in ending ARR, up 101% year-over-year. Operational cash flow hit a Q2 record of $530 million, with free cash flow of $377 million and a $5.01 billion cash reserve, though a parallel SEC civil inquiry into revenue recognition remains unresolved and CrowdStrike posted a GAAP loss from operations of $33.2 million against non-GAAP operating income of $371.6 million.

Cisco Systems reported double-digit order growth across its entire security portfolio, including Splunk, in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2026, with Security revenues rising 14% year over year to $2.23 billion. More than 1,500 customers bought newer offerings such as Secure Access, XDR, Hypershield and AI Defense in the quarter, lifting total net new customers since launch to more than 6,400, while firewall orders climbed more than 30% year over year. Observability revenues, a smaller part of the business, increased 6% to $275 million in the quarter, and for the full fiscal 2026 Security revenues grew 2% to $8.23 billion while Observability revenues rose 4% to $1.10 billion. Cisco also said nearly 4,500 enterprises signed up for Cisco Cloud Control and more than 8,600 customers use Resilient Infrastructure Services powered by Cisco IQ, and it launched Antares, a family of open-weight small language models for identifying known code vulnerabilities. The company faces intensifying competition from Datadog, which has more than 750 AI customers, and CrowdStrike, whose Falcon Flex annual recurring revenue surpassed $2.29 billion, up 101% year over year. Cisco shares have appreciated 38.5% year to date, and the Zacks Consensus Estimate for earnings stands at $1.32 per share, implying 32% growth.