The San Jose fuel-cell maker raised its forecast for the third time this year on data-center demand, while its own filings show how much money the growth is tying up in inventory, unbilled work and East Bay factory space.
Bloom Energy, the San Jose company whose fuel cells generate electricity on a customer’s site, reported on Thursday that its quarterly revenue more than doubled to $1.24 billion, the first time it has topped $1 billion in a quarter, as technology companies racing to build artificial-intelligence data centers turned to power they can install without waiting for the grid.
The company raised its full-year forecast to $4.4 billion to $4.6 billion in revenue, about 122 percent growth at the midpoint, the third increase this year. A company that still carries an accumulated deficit of nearly $3.5 billion reported $250.3 million in quarterly net income attributable to shareholders, compared with a $23.1 million loss a year earlier.
Investors were less enthusiastic than the numbers might suggest. Bloom shares fell 8.76 percent during Thursday’s regular session and dropped more than 4.5 percent more in after-hours trading following the report, Investing.com reported, even though revenue and adjusted earnings exceeded analysts’ consensus estimates.
The pitch
“Electricity is the foundation of economic growth, human well-being and national competitiveness,” KR Sridhar, Bloom’s founder and chief executive, said in the earnings release. “What began with hyperscalers is rapidly moving across market segments because every business needs reliable power to grow.”
On the company’s call with analysts, Mr. Sridhar said Bloom delivered power to Oracle’s data center in Utah less than two months after the project was announced and had equipment ready for the first block of a Nebius data center in New Jersey, according to a MarketBeat summary of the call. He said the company’s backlog was growing faster than revenue.
Product sales, recognized when systems are delivered and accepted, rose 179 percent to $1.07 billion and made up 87 percent of revenue. Bloom’s gross margin was 33.8 percent under standard accounting, up from 29.2 percent. Operating income reached $225.4 million, against $7.8 million a year earlier. The company also joined the S&P 500 during the quarter.
What the headline numbers leave out
The profits on the income statement have not yet turned into cash. Bloom’s operations used $27.1 million in cash in the third quarter, according to the cash-flow statement in its release, after generating $226.4 million in the second quarter. Add $153.5 million in capital spending, and the company’s free cash flow was negative $181 million for the quarter, Chief Financial Officer Simon Edwards told analysts, though positive $42 million for the year to date.
The gap is in working capital. In the third quarter alone, contract assets, which represent work performed but not yet billed, increased by $430.3 million; accounts receivable rose by $175.2 million; and inventories by $170.4 million. Customer deposits and deferred revenue, which bring money in before delivery, offset part of that with a $309.3 million increase. Mr. Edwards said contract assets and receivables should convert to cash as billing milestones are reached and customers pay.
The company’s quarterly filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission shows other items worth watching. Bloom’s non-GAAP figures, which it highlights, exclude $60.1 million in quarterly stock-based compensation. The company carried $2.47 billion in recourse debt against $2.49 billion in cash and equivalents at the end of September.
The filing also details an arrangement with Oracle. Bloom issued the company a warrant to buy about 3.5 million Bloom shares at $113.28, the closing price on Oct. 28, 2025, when the two companies agreed to it as part of their data-center partnership. After the warrant was exercised, Bloom recorded about $306 million as a “customer consideration asset,” which it will amortize as a reduction of revenue as it delivers systems under the Oracle arrangement. So far, $17.3 million has been deducted.
And the filing warns that obtaining air permits for larger installations is “at times, taking longer than expected,” and that construction, land-use and gas permits have also been delayed. Permitting is a gate the company does not control, and the filing says delays can also hold up revenue, because Bloom generally cannot sell its systems to a financier until permits are in hand.
The East Bay angle
For the Bay Area, the growth is showing up mostly in the East Bay. Mr. Sridhar told analysts that Bloom is expanding its real-estate footprint in Fremont to prepare for demand beyond a previously discussed goal of five gigawatts of annual manufacturing capacity. He said the company would add capacity gradually as orders warrant and gave no timeline. The company’s filing says it signed a lease in August for about 158,400 square feet of manufacturing and warehouse space in Fremont, with a term of 150 months, that had not begun as of Sept. 30.
Bloom says it employs more than 2,000 people worldwide and makes its systems in the United States. Capital spending reached $231.3 million in the first nine months of the year, compared with $33.8 million a year earlier.
The same A.I. demand that is filling Bloom’s order book is prompting second thoughts elsewhere in the region. Hayward this week paused new data-center approvals as more Bay Area governments rethink the A.I. building boom. Bloom’s own risk disclosures list an actual or perceived slowdown in the adoption of A.I., and the availability of financing for data-center projects, among the factors that could cause results to differ from its forecast.
For now, the company’s bet is that the grid cannot keep up and that customers will pay for power they can install on their own sites. The third quarter suggests many are. The fourth will show whether Bloom can collect.
Wendell Yamashiro covers business, technology, labor, trade and the Bay Area economy for Trade and Commerce. More from Wendell Yamashiro
