VAST Data, valued at $30 billion, says AI clouds IPO because debt forces them, and it can wait
The $30 billion storage vendor's co-founder says debt covenants, not ambition, are pushing AI clouds to list, and his company has none. Anthropic's filing may test that patience anyway.
Vincent Jiang · 2 min read
No covenant, no hurry
Jeff Denworth, co-founder of VAST Data~$9.1B — VAST Data, private, latest valuation ~$9.1B, the storage-and-data-platform company valued at $30 billion in its April round, told SDxCentral on October 26 that nothing is pushing his company toward a listing 1. "There's no pressure to go out," he said. "A lot of these clouds are going public because their debt covenants insist that they do, and we don't have any of that." A listing, in his words, needs a "frothy" market, and this one is not 1.
The squeeze sits in VAST's customer list
The credit squeeze is not happening to VAST; it is happening to the people who pay VAST. The company counts neoclouds, the rented GPU-cloud providers, from CoreWeave−9.27% — CoreWeave, down 9.27 percent today to Firmus among its customers, and Denworth said credit was the topic he heard most at Nvidia's−3.89% — Nvidia, down 3.89 percent today GTC Berlin, with VAST's supply-chain partners "completely maxed out from a credit perspective" and rising rates making GPU financing harder for non-investment-grade borrowers 1.
Days earlier, Elon Musk wrote that debt markets have "almost entirely shut off access to money" for AI data-center companies without independent revenue: of more than 200 neoclouds, "Some will make it through, but not many" 2. On October 19, Microsoft−1.38% — Microsoft, down 1.38 percent today terminated its anchor-tenant agreement at Nscale's Loughton site in Essex after grid officials said power would not arrive until the 2030s, weeks after Nscale filed for a US IPO 3.
CoreWeave owes $51.6 billion
The listed name in VAST's customer file, which our October 14 reporting showed has also backed the vendor, shows the strain in numbers: CoreWeave ended June with $51.6 billion of debt against $2.575 billion of quarterly revenue, and its $640 million net interest bill topped its $626 million net loss 42.
CoreWeave's debt climbed from $10.6 billion to $51.6 billion in six quarters
Data
| Total debt | |
|---|---|
| Q4 '24 | $10.62B |
| Q1 '25 | $11.9B |
| Q2 '25 | $14.56B |
| Q3 '25 | $18.81B |
| Q4 '25 | $29.82B |
| Q1 '26 | $35.15B |
| Q2 '26 | $51.61B |
CoreWeave's quarterly revenue grew from $189 million to $2.6 billion in ten quarters
Data
| Quarterly revenue | |
|---|---|
| Q1 '24 | $0.19B |
| Q2 '24 | $0.4B |
| Q3 '24 | $0.58B |
| Q4 '24 | $0.75B |
| Q1 '25 | $0.98B |
| Q2 '25 | $1.21B |
| Q3 '25 | $1.37B |
| Q4 '25 | $1.57B |
| Q1 '26 | $2.08B |
| Q2 '26 | $2.58B |
The window is Anthropic's to open
Denworth's own trigger fired the day the interview ran. Anthropic$350B — Anthropic, private, latest valuation $350B filed for a Nasdaq listing on October 26, with a debut possible as soon as November, and Denworth said VAST would face real pressure to follow "when Anthropic and OpenAI$500B — OpenAI, private, latest valuation $500B go out" if markets receive them well; OpenAI's listing is on ice this year 51.
Private marks are still climbing meanwhile: Cyera~$3B — Cyera, private, latest valuation ~$3B, Israel's second-largest private company behind VAST, is in talks at a $20 billion valuation, four months after raising $600 million at $12 billion 6. Watch Anthropic's first trading day. If it lands well, the party VAST says it can skip becomes the party investors demand it join 15.
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