Ticker Teardown Dossier
Vertiv ($VRT), taken apart the way the desk does.
Vertiv (VRT) Teardown Dossier · As of 2026-11-02, refreshed after Q3 2026 results
The VRT dossier is the desk's Vertiv teardown written out as a document, plus what a five-minute video cannot carry: the last eight quarters of Vertiv's own SEC filings in one table (fiscal years for a foreign filer whose quarterly reports carry no structured data), a peer comparison with numbers, the level map rebuilt from the latest close, and a link to every filing used. Rebuilt after each quarterly print.
Look inside before you buy
2,198 words · about 10 min to read · 10 sections · data as of 2 November 2026 · last refreshed after Q3 2026 results
Table of contents
- What is in this dossier
- What this is not
- 1. The teardown
- The setup
- The business: not a chip company
- The structural bet: content per rack
- The order book: the measurable part
- Valuation: mind the multiple
- The street: an estimate, not a promise
- The bear case
- The chart: be honest
- The verdict
- 2. What changed since it was written
- 3. The filings: the last eight quarters
- 4. Valuation against the peers
- 5. Level map
- 6. Sources
- 7. What this dossier cannot do
- More dossiers in this theme
Excerpt
1. The teardown
Written 2026-09-11, with prices as of 2026-09-11. Figures in this part are as the desk read them that day; parts 2 to 5 carry the numbers as of 2026-11-02.
The setup
Vertiv is up 81% over the last year. It is also down about 17% from where it traded three months ago, and down 14% in the last month alone. Run the arithmetic and roughly a third of that year's gain has come back off in one stretch, on a $95 billion company whose backlog is still growing 25% year over year. Nothing in the filings changed.
The business: not a chip company
Start with what Vertiv sells, because it is the least glamorous name in the AI trade. It does not make chips and it does not own data centers. It makes the equipment that keeps one alive. Thermal first: air cooling, liquid cooling, coolant distribution units, rear-door heat exchangers. Then power: uninterruptible power supplies, switchgear, busways, rack power distribution. Then the rack and row systems that bundle the two. Roughly 3 quarters of revenue is product, a quarter is service, split about half Americas, 30% Europe and the Middle East, 20% Asia Pacific.
The structural bet: content per rack
Here is the structural bet in one sentence. Every incremental gigawatt of AI compute pulls more Vertiv content per rack. A dense accelerator rack does not simply need more power, it needs a different kind of cooling, because air stops working at the densities this generation already runs. The coolant has to reach the chip. Our own thesis has the liquid cooling attach rate on new racks inflecting from under 10% toward more than half. That is an estimate, not a disclosed figure, so hold it loosely. What is disclosed is the product line itself: Vertiv bought CoolTera in 2024 for direct-to-chip cooling intellectual property, released the CoolPhase Flex coolant distribution unit aimed at megawatt-class rack density, and published a joint reference architecture with NVIDIA for liquid-cooled NVL72 racks.
One table from the document
3. The filings: the last eight quarters
| USD millions, period ended | 2024-12-31 | 2025-03-31 | 2025-06-30 | 2025-09-30 | 2025-12-31 | 2026-03-31 | 2026-06-30 | 2026-09-30 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fiscal period | Q4 2024 | Q1 2025 | Q2 2025 | Q3 2025 | Q4 2025 | Q1 2026 | Q2 2026 | Q3 2026 |
| Source filing | 10-K 2025-02-18 | 10-Q 2025-04-23 | 10-Q 2025-07-30 | 10-Q 2025-10-22 | 10-K 2026-02-13 | 10-Q 2026-04-22 | 10-Q 2026-07-29 | 10-Q 2026-10-28 |
| Revenue | 2,346 | 2,036 | 2,638 | 2,676 | 2,880 | 2,650 | 3,274 | 4,313 |
| Gross margin | 37.1% | 33.7% | 34.0% | 37.8% | 38.9% | 37.7% | 37.7% | 38.1% |
| Operating income | 457.2 | 290.7 | 442.4 | 516.7 | 579.9 | 440.1 | 637.9 | 983.8 |
| Net income | 147.0 | 164.5 | 324.2 | 398.5 | 445.6 | 390.1 | 497.8 | 764.5 |
| Operating cash flow | 425.2 | 303.3 | 322.9 | 482.7 | 1,005 | 766.8 | 1,100 | 794.0 |
| Capex | -60.7 | -36.5 | -45.0 | -45.2 | -93.3 | -112.6 | -173.3 | -139.1 |
| Free cash flow | 364.5 | 266.8 | 277.9 | 437.5 | 911.6 | 654.2 | 926.5 | 654.9 |
| Cash and equivalents | 1,228 | 1,467 | 1,641 | 1,396 | 1,728 | 2,151 | 2,811 | 3,513 |
| Debt (book, excl. leases) | 2,928 | 2,925 | 2,922 | 2,918 | 2,913 | 2,922 | 2,940 | 2,928 |
| Diluted shares (M) | 386.3* | 390.1 | 389.8 | 390.9 | 390.7* | 392.1 | 392.7 | 392.7 |
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What the dossier has that the video does not
The filings themselves: revenue, gross margin, operating income, net income, operating cash flow, capex, free cash flow, cash, debt and diluted shares, quarter by quarter, each column dated with the filing it comes from. A foreign filer whose quarterly reports carry no structured data gets its fiscal years, and the dossier says so.
Never stale
Every dossier carries an "as of" date and the quarter it was last refreshed after. It is rebuilt after each print, and the desk's daily check flags any dossier left more than 45 days without a refresh. The written teardown keeps its date, and a "what changed since" section gives the move in the price and the filings since.
What is inside
- The teardown in writing: the business, the bull case, the full bear case and the verdict, dated.
- What changed since it was written: the price move and every SEC filing since.
- Eight quarters of the company's own SEC filings in one table, each column dated, with a plain read of what the table says.
- Peers with numbers: market cap, revenue growth, operating margin, EV / sales and distance from the 52-week high.
- The level map rebuilt from the latest close: where the price sits against the 52-week range and each level.
- Sources: a link to every filing and results release used.
Buy it if
- You hold or watch $VRT and want a structured read before acting.
- You want levels you can check on the chart, not an opinion.
Skip it if
- You want a buy signal. A dossier explains and maps; it does not signal.
- You want every name on the desk. The Teardown Library covers every dossier, current and future, for less than four dossiers.
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An educational research publication, not investment advice, trade signals, a managed account, or an advisory service. Nothing in it is a recommendation to buy or sell any security. See our disclosures.