Cloudflare2026年投资者日AI主导的Agentic互联网展望

+19173448390peter.weed@bernsteinsg.comArmin Hadavi, CFA +1 917 344 8463armin.hadavi@bernsteinsg.com Market-PerformPrice Target NET Cloudflare (NET) Investor Day 2026: Al everywhere! how its core is ideal starting point for the emerging"agentic internet,"where Al agents driveapplication execution.In their mind"agentic internet"is next majortechnicalarchitectureshift as developer ecosystems naturally evolve overdecade-long cycles. edge-native architecturefrom Actl, SSE security Actll, and Act ll Workers'"lsolates"-baseddeveloperplatformprovidea structural performanceand cost advantageovertraditionalhyperscalersfor Agent workloads that aremore dynamic and personalized.Their newAgent-centric Cloudflare OSis the secret sauce including a)an Al Agent Workspace,b)centrallymanaged context layer,c)secure systemofrecord,and d) LLM modeloptionalityAkeythemewasthat Cloudflare isthenaturalplacetodeployagent-drivenworkloadsvs.hyperscalers'microservices-based cloudapplication model.While those hyperscalersexecutionpathsperuser,increasing computecomplexityand cost.Cloudflarebelieves itsarchitecture is better suitedforthis shift,potentially enabling materially greater efficiencyand positioning it as a differentiated execution layer for Al applications. Our own added competitive context: we understand why Cloudflare is urgently tryingto pursue this Al Agent opportunity. There is a battle emerging here, but as we saw whilerecently hosting Vercel's founder for a fireside chat, Cloudflare is fighting formidable newcompetitors,particularly Vercel+Next.JS.Afew emerging concerns for Cloudflare inourmind:an edgenetwork/proxybased approachmaybe adisadvantage;tight linkage ofthe Cloudflare platform to their network creates constraints and worries vendorlock-in thatmany buyers try to avoid; and code suggestion tools natively select against Cloudflare forthecore deployment environment when asked to design the architecture themselves. InvestmentImplicationsNochangetoourmodel,$136PT,orMarket-Performrecommendation Cloudflare framed this Al Agent-first evolution through its Act progression: Act I (connect), Act Il(protect), Act Il (build), and now Act IV (content monetization).The company's ambition is to become the default cloud platform for agents, combiningnetworking, security,and compute into a tightly integrated stack.Management highlighted that approximately 80% of leading Alcompanies alreadyuse Cloudflare in some capacity,reinforcing its relevance within the Alecosystem. enterprises are expectedto spend the nexttwoyears heavilyfocused on identifyingand mitigating vulnerabilities,particularly asLLMs introduce new attack surfaces (referred to as"Mythos" risks).Cloudflare is positioning itself as both a pre-deployment andreal-time security layer, partnering with leading model providers such as Anthropic to identify risks before release and protectapplications inproduction. serverless and greenfield deployments.Managementhighlighted a surge in code generation driven by Al, but noted that agentsthemselves must increasingly write and execute code due to limitations in context windows, accuracy,and the inefficiencyof tool-calling across multiple services. This further reinforces the need for lightweight, cost-efficient compute primitives.Cloudflare's approach contrasts with hyperscaler environments, where costs can escalate quickly in highly dynamic workloads, Commercially, Cloudflare hasundergone a significant go-to-market transformation overthe past two years. Thecompany has shifted toward moretargeted enterprise selling, expanded its partner ecosystem (with partner contribution risingacross the customer lifecycle,from onboardingthroughrenewal.The company believes it remains in the early stages of largeenterprise penetration, with platform consolidationtrends working in its favor.Separately,Mark Anderson (headof revenue)announced he'll retire soon.Cloudflare Sales team saw massiveboost to results over the past 2+years when he joined thecompany. On the financial side,management provided updated long-termtargets anda more detailed framework for evaluatinguniteconomics.Currentunit economicmargin stands at approximately44%,whilegrossmarginis beingpressuredbyfreetier investments and mix shifttowardnewer products (Acts Ill and IV).Importantly,management emphasized that lowergrossmargins do not imply weaker overall economics, drawing parallels to the evolution of Microsoft's cloudbusiness, where earlyyear-end 2028, Rule of 50 performance by 2027 (and higher in future years), and GAAP profitability by 2028 at the latest.Notably, the company raised its long-term operating margin outlook by approximately 10%, driven by expected efficiencies insales and marketing, R&D, and G&A through Al-driven productivity improvements. References to"Bernstein" or the"Firm" in these disclosures relate to the following entities: Bernstein Institutional Services LLC (April 1, 2024 onwards), Sanford C. Bernstein & Co., LLC (pre April 1, 2024), Bernstei