The following is excerpted from the question-and-answer section of the transcript.
(Questions from industry analysts are provided in full, but answers are omitted - download the transcript to see the full question-and-answer session)
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: <_ALACRA_META_ABSTRACT>Well, Rajiv, let's start with a big picture question. Where would you like to see Nutanix in the next five years?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: That's a great jumping off point. But before we dig into some of those pieces, I wanted to talk a little bit about your background,
right? You spent time at Cisco, Broadcom, VMware before landing on Nutanix. Can you tell us a little bit about what you took away
from those experiences and how that's informed your leadership of Nutanix?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: That's great. Now Rajiv, the debate between private and public cloud has been ongoing for years. So from your perspective, what
are the enduring advantages of private cloud infrastructure? And why do you believe this remains a resilient and strategic opportunity
in today's landscape?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: And why is it that you think that most of the AI workloads today are running on public cloud? Do you inevitably see a situation where
some of that gets repatriated back to on-prem?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Very interesting, and I want to come back to that as pertains to GPT-in-a-Box, but I want to pull Rukmini into the conversation.
Rukmini, Nutanix recently reported 4Q results. It sounds like there may have been a bit of confusion around how to interpret ARR,
NRR given some of the larger, more complex transactions that you guys are now doing on top of the change in methodology that
you guys introduced. So maybe you could clarify for the audience the dynamics at play here?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Very good. And maybe moving on to fiscal '26 guidance more broadly. Can you walk us through some of the puts and takes that
inform the initial guide? How do you balance some of the long-term secular tailwinds versus some of the near-term dynamics you're
contending with? Fed uncertainty, duration headwinds, deal cycle elongation.
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Very helpful color. And for Rajiv, one dynamic that's unique about the partnerships that Rukmini is referencing here is when you
think about Dell and Pure Storage, right? Nutanix is now supporting external storage. You already announced two early wins with
PowerFlex, pretty exciting, considering it's only been in the market for a couple of months. So can you talk about what informed this
decision to really start supporting external storage? And what are the advantages to this approach?
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SEPTEMBER 09, 2025 / 12:25AM, NTNX.OQ - Nutanix Inc at Goldman Sachs Communacopia & Technology
Conference
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
:
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Yeah. And what's your confidence rate that, inevitably, when these come due for hardware refreshes, that you can start to roll those
over into full stack HCI deployments?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Yeah. And Rukmini, I think one question that's always on investors' minds is, now that you're supporting external storage, how do
the economics compare relative to a full stack HCI?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Does that come all bundled? Or can they adopt NKP down the line and the --
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Very helpful. And I want to drill in on the new customer momentum. It's been very strong for Nutanix for the last several quarters.
You've been investing quite a bit in channel enablement. You've also announced several OEM partnerships. We touched on a few
of them. How would you rank the drivers of this accelerated customer momentum? And how durable do you believe this is?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Great. Nutanix's product velocity has expanded the scope from infrastructure modernization to really hybrid multi-cloud enablement,
like how are customers now embracing this broader portfolio in practice? And what are some of the most compelling ways they're
adopting more of the platform?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: You're starting to see more lands with NC2 as the anchor product. Is that on the back of some of these deals that you struck with
AWS around the migration?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: And it's still ongoing?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: And then, Rukmini, for you, how early are we in the multiproduct attach opportunity, right? You guys have a ton of new products
to sell as a part of the broader platform. So when do you expect this to be a more meaningful contributor to NRR beyond the workload
expansion opportunity?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: And I'm curious, Rajiv, for you. Like when you think about the NKP opportunity, is this more migrations of existing VMs on to containers?
Or is this really positioned as more of, hey, we're going after net new apps because they're all being developed through in containerized
environments. So can you peel back that onion for us a little bit?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Very helpful. And maybe we move on to the big topic of conversation, which is VMware. You guys have been quite vocal about the
opportunity around the VMware disruption, but also, I think, very deliberate in messaging this as a gradual multiyear opportunity.
So maybe remind us why this is the case? And how far along you think we are in this opportunity?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Very, very early then. I think about the timing of renewals piece, like in '22, the deal was announced, in '23, it was closed, right? So
you look at '25, '26 like a lot of these customers are on three-year ELA. So I mean, how big is the pool or addressable pool over the
next 12 to 18 months when you think about this opportunity?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Right. Rukmini, from your side, I mean, what have you seen from a pricing perspective out there as it pertains to VMware? I mean,
are you seeing Broadcom get more or less aggressive on the pricing side as you guys go after some of these larger enterprise deals?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Understood. I want to shift the conversation to margins. Nutanix has done a commendable job growing into its cost base with free
cash margins now in the high 20s. Your guide suggests OpEx will run a bit hotter in '26 versus the past couple of years. I guess what
are the primary investment initiatives for this year? And how would you frame the drivers of leverage in the years ahead?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Fantastic. And with two minutes left, Rajiv, I want to close out with a question on AI. You've been in the market with GPT-in-a-Box
for over two years now. There's a big debate around the ROI of use cases right now, especially around AI. So where are you seeing
the most success today? And how close do you think we are to enterprise AI maturity to the extent that it can start benefiting Nutanix's
business?
Question: Matthew Martino - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst
: Excellent. Well, with that, we are almost exactly out of time. So thank you so much, Rajiv and Rukmini, for joining us today, and
appreciate it. Looking forward to having you next year.
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SEPTEMBER 09, 2025 / 12:25AM, NTNX.OQ - Nutanix Inc at Goldman Sachs Communacopia & Technology
Conference
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