GE Vernova Backlog Hits $176B as AI Power Demand Drives Orders

Analog Devices Chief Financial Officer Rich Puccio said the company expects demand strength across its portfolio to support double-digit growth into fiscal 2027, citing a broad industrial recovery alongside continued momentum in data centers, aerospace and defense, and automated test equipment. Speaking with JPMorgan analyst Harlan Sur at the firm's 2026 U.S. All Stars Conference in London, Puccio said aerospace and defense, automated test equipment, and data centers account for roughly 30% of the company's business and have been growing at high rates. The aerospace and defense business was nearing a $2 billion annualized revenue run rate as of the fiscal third-quarter exit rate, up from approximately $1 billion a year earlier, while the automated test equipment business was operating at an annualized run rate of about $1 billion and the data center business is running at about $2 billion annually, split roughly equally between power and optical products and growing about 100% year over year. Puccio declined to provide a mid-quarter bookings update or formal guidance for the January quarter but said Analog Devices expects to perform better than its normal seasonal pattern, in which the first fiscal quarter is typically down in the mid-single digits sequentially. He said more than half of the company's industrial subsegments remain double digits below the consumption line, that the company guided for a record gross margin in the fourth quarter, and that its pending acquisition of Alif Semiconductor is not expected to be material to revenue or costs in the near term, with the business more likely to ramp beginning around 2028.

Heartland Advisors' Opportunistic Value Equity Strategy named Texas Instruments a significant contributor to its second-quarter 2026 performance, citing the chipmaker's entry into the AI infrastructure narrative. In its Q2 2026 investor letter, the firm said Texas Instruments, the world's largest analog semiconductor manufacturer, has seen its data center power management revenues rise more than 90% year over year as its chips handle electrical power regulation and management in data centers. The strategy returned 12.32% in the quarter, trailing the Russell 3000 Value Index's 14.02% gain, with negative security selection in Technology offsetting positive selection in nine of eleven sectors. Heartland noted the stock rose more than 70% through late June and closed at $270.87 per share on September 21, 2026, returning 4.16% over the past month and 48.80% over the past 52 weeks, with a market capitalization of $247.37 billion. The firm said Texas Instruments has passed peak capital expenditures in its multi-year fabrication-capacity buildout, and that higher fab utilization should drive incremental profits and cash flow, though the business now trades between its price target and intrinsic value. According to the article, 111 hedge fund portfolios held Texas Instruments at the end of the second quarter, up from 71 in the previous quarter.

Vertiv has agreed to acquire UtilityInnovation Group for $1.5 billion, adding behind-the-meter power systems and onsite generation to its data center portfolio. The deal follows Vertiv's acquisition of Thermal Labs, which strengthened its liquid cooling and cold-plate technology, as the company builds out power and cooling equipment for increasingly power-hungry AI racks. Vertiv's MegaMod HDX platform combines direct-to-chip liquid cooling with air cooling for dense AI systems. Rival Eaton is pursuing the same trend from a broader power management angle, having developed its own 800 VDC architecture for AI factories and a Beam Rubin DSX platform with Nvidia for end-to-end power and cooling. The comparison piece argues Vertiv offers a more direct bet on AI infrastructure, while Eaton spans a wider slice of the electrical distribution and grid chain.