SAMART eyes signing new contracts worth over 10 billion baht in second half, pushing backlog to 20 billion baht

Leidos has introduced UpHold Effect Agentic SOC Automation, an agentic AI capability that uses AI agents around the clock to help security operations center teams identify threats requiring immediate action amid a deluge of cyber alerts. The capability is a feature within UpHold Effect, Leidos' offering for agentic cyber response and part of the UpHold product suite, and it works across an organization's existing security tools to investigate alerts, gather information and recommend next steps rather than requiring agencies to replace their existing systems. Customers determine how much authority the AI receives based on mission, risk tolerance and governance requirements, and recommendations and actions create auditable records showing what the AI observed, concluded and proposed or did. A FedRAMP Class D High deployment option is available, and the capability can also provide a pathway toward Department of war Impact Level 4 and 5 environments with appropriate government sponsorship. Steve Hull, president of Leidos Digital, said cyber teams need to keep pace with threats without giving up control, and that the capability can take on more of the investigative workload while giving agencies the flexibility to decide when AI recommends an action and when it is allowed to act. Leidos, headquartered in Reston, Virginia, with 50,000 global employees, reported annual revenues of approximately $17.2 billion for the fiscal year ended January 2, 2026.

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.

Palo Alto Networks has launched Unit 42 Continuous Frontier AI Defense, an annual subscription service that uses Anthropic's Claude Mythos, OpenAI's GPT-5.6-Cyber, and open-weight models to continuously identify, validate, and remediate vulnerabilities across web applications, APIs, and cloud infrastructure. Reuters reported the service is designed to respond to growing attacker use of AI, while Palo Alto Networks said AI can compress breach cycles from weeks to hours in some cases, with pricing depending on the AI models customers select. The launch fits the company's broader AI-security push, following its April Koi acquisition to secure agentic AI endpoints and its September Console acquisition to add agentic capabilities to Cortex. Palo Alto Networks ended fiscal 2026 with $9.1 billion of Next-Generation Security ARR, up 63% year over year, and remaining performance obligations of $21.2 billion, up 34%, while targeting $11.075 billion to $11.175 billion of NGS ARR in fiscal 2027. Subscription and support revenue accounted for $9.2 billion of its $11.48 billion fiscal 2026 revenue, and the company generated $4.1 billion of free cash flow, though GAAP gross margin fell from 73.4% in fiscal 2025 to 70.4% in fiscal 2026 and operating margin dropped from 13.5% to 6.1%.

Federal authorities have closed criminal and civil probes into CrowdStrike Holdings over its distribution deals without pursuing legal action, removing a legal overhang that had weighed on sentiment. The company has been on a sharp upswing, with a 30-day share price return of 33.28% and a 90-day gain of 43.85% as the market digests both the cleared investigations and strong quarterly results. CrowdStrike last closed at $252.13, while the most followed narrative anchors fair value closer to $193.13, implying the stock is 31% overvalued. The company's strategic focus on Next-Gen SIEM, cloud-native security, and large-scale partnerships, along with its expansive data capabilities for AI development, positions it for robust demand growth. Still, the story could change quickly if newer products or acquisitions disappoint, or if rising competition pressures the rich P/E assumptions already reflected in the valuation.