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    Brad ZelnickDeutsche Bank

    Brad Zelnick's questions to CoreWeave Inc (CRWV) leadership

    Brad Zelnick's questions to CoreWeave Inc (CRWV) leadership • Q2 2025

    Question

    Brad Zelnick asked about the relative economics of inference versus training workloads and requested more detail on the new flexible capacity and spot products currently in customer preview.

    Answer

    CEO Michael Intrator explained that under CoreWeave's long-term contract model, the economics for inference and training are identical. For the new flexible products, he noted that the primary challenge is that available capacity is almost immediately consumed by large clients for long-term contracts, but the company is committed to expanding its spot offering to attract new users and use cases.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Oracle Corp (ORCL) leadership

    Brad Zelnick's questions to Oracle Corp (ORCL) leadership • Q4 2025

    Question

    Brad Zelnick from Deutsche Bank asked why Oracle's full-stack technology, from applications down to silicon, remains a critical advantage in the current era of computing.

    Answer

    CTO Larry Ellison explained that this integrated approach creates a powerful feedback loop. Building applications on their own database improves the database, and using their Autonomous Database to run the cloud makes it more reliable, secure, and cost-effective. He stated that this ability to innovate at every layer of the stack allows Oracle to build faster, cheaper, and more reliable solutions than competitors.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Oracle Corp (ORCL) leadership • Q3 2025

    Question

    Brad Zelnick from Deutsche Bank asked about the 'Stargate' AI project, questioning what unique value Oracle provides that led partners like OpenAI and NVIDIA to choose them, and how this related-party transaction would be reflected in the financials.

    Answer

    Executive Chairman and CTO Lawrence Ellison stated that Oracle's key advantage is its superior technology, which runs AI clusters faster and more economically, translating to a significant cost advantage for customers. He noted the current $130 billion RPO was achieved even before any Stargate contracts. CEO Safra Catz added that Stargate deals will flow through the financials in a standard, transparent manner, without complicating analysis.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Oracle Corp (ORCL) leadership • Q2 2025

    Question

    Brad Zelnick asked for perspective on AI 'scaling laws,' questioning if there are diminishing returns on using larger GPU clusters for model training and how Oracle maintains its leadership in AI infrastructure.

    Answer

    Chairman and CTO Larry Ellison explained that AI training speed depends on both larger GPU clusters and, critically, faster networks to feed them data. He emphasized that Oracle's key differentiator and area of heavy investment is its high-speed networking infrastructure, which prevents data bottlenecks. Ellison believes that by continuing to speed up its networks, Oracle will avoid diminishing returns and maintain its performance advantage in AI training.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Oracle Corp (ORCL) leadership • Q1 2025

    Question

    Brad Zelnick of Deutsche Bank asked how Oracle's security posture, beyond just automation, is helping it win large OCI deals, particularly with government clients, amid a landscape of high-profile cyber incidents.

    Answer

    Chairman and CTO Larry Ellison outlined a four-part, next-generation security strategy. He announced Oracle is eliminating passwords in favor of biometric authentication, introducing 'Zero Trust Packet Routing' to secure data from the user to the database, leveraging automation to eliminate human error, and using AI for code generation to prevent security vulnerabilities from being written into programs. He positioned these AI-based systems as essential for winning the 'cyber war' against increasingly sophisticated threats.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Zscaler Inc (ZS) leadership

    Brad Zelnick's questions to Zscaler Inc (ZS) leadership • Q3 2025

    Question

    Brad Zelnick asked for details on the structure, duration, and accounting of the new Z-Flex deals and questioned whether billings will remain the most appropriate metric to measure Zscaler's momentum.

    Answer

    CFO Remo Canessa confirmed that Zscaler plans to transition from billings to ARR as its primary metric in fiscal 2026, viewing it as more suitable for the platform model. CEO Jay Chaudhry added that Z-Flex offers customers flexibility to swap and add modules at pre-agreed pricing, leading to more strategic relationships and longer contract durations of four to five years.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Okta Inc (OKTA) leadership

    Brad Zelnick's questions to Okta Inc (OKTA) leadership • Q1 2026

    Question

    Brad Zelnick from Deutsche Bank asked about the increased conservatism in Okta's guidance, questioning the combined impact of the go-to-market specialization and new macro concerns on Q1 results and the forward outlook.

    Answer

    CEO Todd McKinnon stated that Q1 was on track and the company is optimistic. CFO Brett Tighe clarified that macro headwinds were not a factor in Q1 but are being prudently factored into future guidance based on qualitative feedback from the market, not specific data. He emphasized that despite this new factor, the overall guidance philosophy remains less conservative than in past years.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Salesforce Inc (CRM) leadership

    Brad Zelnick's questions to Salesforce Inc (CRM) leadership • Q1 2026

    Question

    Brad Zelnick inquired about the most advanced use cases, ROI, and business impact emerging from AgentForce and its integration with Data Cloud compared to just a few months ago.

    Answer

    CEO Marc Benioff highlighted international customer demand, such as from Fujitsu, and embedded use cases like in Smartsheet, where AgentForce acts as 'digital labor' for support and license changes. He noted that the current rate of innovation exceeds customer adoption, reinforcing his strategy to aggressively expand the sales organization into high-growth markets after a period of financially-driven restraint.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Salesforce Inc (CRM) leadership • Q1 2026

    Question

    Brad Zelnick of Deutsche Bank asked about the most advanced use cases, ROI, and impact of AgentForce that Salesforce is currently observing in the market.

    Answer

    Chair and CEO Marc Benioff described the broad, international demand for an 'agentic layer' around entire companies, citing Fujitsu in Japan as an example. He also highlighted how customers like Smartsheet are embedding AgentForce for digital labor tasks like support and license provisioning. He emphasized that the current rate of innovation is outpacing customer adoption, creating a significant opportunity that justifies aggressive investment in distribution.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Salesforce Inc (CRM) leadership • Q3 2025

    Question

    Brad Zelnick of Deutsche Bank asked for more details on the "More Core" initiative, seeking to understand what it involves and the size of the opportunity it represents.

    Answer

    CEO Marc Benioff explained that "More Core" is a multi-year effort to integrate all applications, including formerly separate ones like Commerce and Marketing, into a single, unified platform. He stated this integration is critical because effective AI requires seamless access to a comprehensive set of data and metadata. This initiative ensures all products, from sales to Slack, operate as one piece of code, which is a key enabler for the Agentforce strategy.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Workday Inc (WDAY) leadership

    Brad Zelnick's questions to Workday Inc (WDAY) leadership • Q1 2026

    Question

    Brad Zelnick of Deutsche Bank AG asked about the potential ceiling for AI product adoption within customer expansions and sought clarification on the 0.5 point CRPO contribution from implementation tenants.

    Answer

    CEO Carl Eschenbach expressed confidence in continued AI adoption, noting that 25-30% of sales to the installed base in recent quarters included an AI SKU and that customers view Workday as a strategic AI partner. CFO Zane Rowe clarified that the CRPO contribution from tenants was not in the prior forecast and will be included prospectively, expecting about a 1-point impact for the rest of the year.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Intuit Inc (INTU) leadership

    Brad Zelnick's questions to Intuit Inc (INTU) leadership • Q3 2025

    Question

    Brad Zelnick requested a deeper analysis of the 47% growth in TurboTax Live and full-service offerings, asking about the specific drivers, the impact of the local strategy, and areas of constructive dissatisfaction.

    Answer

    CEO Sasan Goodarzi explained the growth came from three areas: retaining existing customers through life changes by offering expert help, breakthrough adoption of full-service by new customers, and a successful go-to-market campaign that drove unprecedented traffic. He identified an area for improvement in the initial customer interaction, noting that requiring authentication upfront created friction for new assisted-tax customers, a key learning for future seasons.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Intuit Inc (INTU) leadership • Q3 2025

    Question

    Brad Zelnick requested a deeper analysis of the 47% growth in TurboTax Live and full-service offerings, asking for specific drivers, the impact of the local strategy, and areas where management is 'constructively dissatisfied'.

    Answer

    CEO Sasan Goodarzi explained the growth came from retaining existing customers through life changes and a breakthrough in acquiring new full-service customers for both consumer and business tax. He identified a key area of dissatisfaction and opportunity: reducing friction in the initial customer journey. For instance, requiring authentication upfront for new users from the assisted category created falloff, an issue they are now addressing.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Intuit Inc (INTU) leadership • Q1 2025

    Question

    Brad Zelnick inquired about the drivers for the full-year Global Business Solutions (GBS) guidance, given the 20% online ecosystem growth, and asked about the increased Q1 marketing spend for TurboTax and its implications for the full year.

    Answer

    CFO Sandeep Aujla explained that confidence in the GBS guidance is reinforced by strong customer engagement, low attrition, a favorable mix shift towards the mid-market (which grew 42%), and strong services adoption. Regarding marketing, he noted the earlier start for the consumer campaign is a strategic move to disrupt the assisted tax market, which has shown strong early ROI. He expects the full-year consumer marketing budget to be up only slightly.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Intuit Inc (INTU) leadership • Q4 2024

    Question

    Brad Zelnick asked for more color on the recent restructuring, specifically how any savings would be reinvested and which initiatives would be prioritized.

    Answer

    CEO Sasan Goodarzi emphasized that the decision was difficult but necessary to position the company for the future. He confirmed that all resulting funds are being reinvested into five key growth areas previously outlined, including AI, live services, and mid-market. He clarified that the FY25 guidance does not depend on these investments yielding immediate returns. CFO Sandeep Aujla added that hiring for these initiatives was already underway before the announcement.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Snowflake Inc (SNOW) leadership

    Brad Zelnick's questions to Snowflake Inc (SNOW) leadership • Q1 2026

    Question

    Brad Zelnick from Deutsche Bank inquired about Snowpark adoption in data science use cases beyond simple workload migration and asked what underpins the confidence in the strong full-year revenue guidance.

    Answer

    CEO Sridhar Ramaswamy confirmed strong adoption of Notebooks for ML model training, while EVP of Product Christian Kleinerman noted heavy use of Snowpark for unstructured data processing. CFO Michael Scarpelli based the guidance confidence on observed customer behavior, improved visibility into new workloads, and an uptick in migrations, aided by the free SnowConvert tool.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to Microsoft Corp (MSFT) leadership

    Brad Zelnick's questions to Microsoft Corp (MSFT) leadership • Q2 2025

    Question

    Brad Zelnick from Deutsche Bank asked about the future of Microsoft's Copilot portfolio, specifically how the company plans to evolve its packaging and go-to-market strategy to reach the broadest possible customer base.

    Answer

    CEO Satya Nadella highlighted recent moves to drive broader adoption, such as introducing Copilot Chat for all enterprise users and making the advanced 'Think Deeper' feature free for consumers. He explained that as inference costs come down, Microsoft can make premium features more ubiquitous across its entire portfolio, including M365, GitHub, and Security Copilot.

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    Brad Zelnick's questions to ServiceNow Inc (NOW) leadership

    Brad Zelnick's questions to ServiceNow Inc (NOW) leadership • Q3 2024

    Question

    Brad Zelnick inquired about the drivers behind the significant uptick in headcount and OpEx growth in the second half of the year, asking if it was catch-up spending or a reflection of future opportunities. He also asked CEO Bill McDermott to elaborate on the concept of "elite-level execution" and its durability.

    Answer

    CFO Gina Mastantuono confirmed the headcount increase, particularly in quota-bearing reps, reflects confidence in future opportunities like Now Assist and the new data fabric, with similar growth expected to continue. CEO Bill McDermott attributed "elite-level execution" to hiring great leaders, fostering a collaborative and communicative culture, and the collective will of 26,000 employees to win. He asserted the company is not close to its peak and that constant innovation will prevent any reversion to the mean.

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