Exclusive: AI storage platform Vast Data aimed for $25B valuation in new round, sources say

Vast Data, which offers an AI-friendly data storage platform, is in the market to raise a new round at a giant leap in valuation.

Earlier this year, the 9-year-old company was seeking a valuation of around $25 billion, according to a person familiar with the deal. Should it achieve that, it would be a massive jump from its $9 billion Series E valuation secured in December 2023.

The deal was not finalized, and terms — including its valuation — could change, this person said, adding that the requested valuation was high at the time, despite impressive growth. Many VCs are interested in and watching Vast, other sources tell TechCrunch.

Vast didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Vast Data offers data management software coupled with unified CPU, GPU, and data hardware from vendors like Supermicro, HPE, and Cisco. Whereas old-school data storage options rely on tiers (low-cost storage options for long-term storage, higher-end options for more frequently used data), Vast aims to eliminate such tiers. It is particularly aimed at flash storage.

AI has been a boon to Vast’s business. The company’s platform stores structured, semi-structured, and unstructured data in one place, which accelerates data retrieval and, it says, reduces the cost of model training and inference.

The company’s customers include large enterprises such as Pixar, ServiceNow, and xAI, as well as next-generation AI cloud providers like CoreWeave and Lambda, which use Vast’s technology to offer storage capabilities to their end users.

Vast had annual recurring revenue (ARR) of $200 million when it raised its Series E about 18 months ago, TechCrunch reported. The company has been growing at 2.5x to 3x year-over-year, Renen Hallak, Vast’s CEO and co-founder, said on a podcast last May. The company has also been free cash flow positive for four years, Hallak said.

On data storage capabilities, Vast competes with 16-year-old publicly traded Pure Storage that has a market capitalization of nearly $17 billion, and 12-year-old Weka, which last year raised a $140 million round at a $1.6 billion valuation. Vast is also developing a database architecture that is competitive with Databricks’ offering.

Prior to the round it is currently working on, the company has raised a total of $381 million from investors, including Fidelity Management & Research Company, NEA, BOND Capital, and Drive Capital.