Palo Alto(PANW) The Motley Fool·2025-05-24 08:15Core Viewpoint - Palo Alto Networks reported strong fiscal Q3 earnings that exceeded analyst expectations, but the stock price declined due to the company not raising the top end of its fiscal 2025 guidance for the first time this year [1][16]. Financial Performance - Fiscal Q3 revenue increased by 15% year over year to 0.80, surpassing guidance of 0.77 [11]. - Remaining performance obligations (RPO) grew 19% to 6.2 billion [11]. Platformization Strategy - The company is progressing with its "platformization" strategy, transitioning customers to its three cybersecurity platforms: Strata, Cortex, and Prisma Cloud [4][7]. - In fiscal Q3, Palo Alto secured over 19 new platformization deals, bringing the total to 1,250 platformizations among its top 5,000 customers [6]. - The goal is to reach between 2,500 and 3,500 platformization customers by fiscal year 2030, targeting an annual recurring revenue run-rate of 5.1 billion, driven by a 200% increase in XSIAM ARR [9]. - SASE (secure access service edge) revenue climbed 36%, with 40% of new SASE customers being new to Palo Alto, and overall SASE customer count grew by 22% to 6,000 [10]. Future Guidance - For fiscal Q4, the company forecasts revenue growth of 14% to 15%, projecting revenue between 2.51 billion [12]. - The full-year revenue guidance was raised to 9.19 billion, with adjusted EPS guidance increased to 3.28 [13][14]. Market Reaction - The stock has seen a modest increase of 1.8% in 2025 and a nearly 19% rise over the past year, despite the recent dip following earnings [1]. - The forward price-to-sales ratio is 11.4 times fiscal 2026 estimates, indicating high investor expectations [17].