Energy Vault (NRGV) Q1 2026 Earnings Transcript

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DATE

Tuesday, May 5, 2026 at 4:30 p.m. ET

CALL PARTICIPANTS

• Chairman and Chief Executive Officer — Robert Piconi
• Chief Financial Officer — Michael Beer

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TAKEAWAYS

• Revenue -- $21.9 million, up 150% year over year, driven by higher energy storage project deliveries and new asset portfolio contributions.
• Adjusted Gross Margin -- 27.9%, with adjusted gross profit of $6.1 million, reflecting removal of asset operating project-related depreciation and amortization ahead of mid-year project operations.
• Adjusted EBITDA -- Negative $13.6 million, compared to negative $11.3 million the prior year, due to investments in own-and-operate strategy and development scaling.
• Cash Balance -- $117.1 million in cash and equivalents, up 148% from last year, supported by financing initiatives and strong project execution.
• Convertible Notes Offering -- $150 million in convertible senior notes raised, upsized from $125 million, partially used to repay $45 million in higher-cost debt and includes a cap call with an $8.12 implied conversion price.
• Investment Tax Credit (ITC) Monetization -- $12 million of net ITC transfers completed, with $40 million in total proceeds expected from projects placed in service.
• Backlog -- Record $1.35 billion, up 108% year over year, with over 80% linked to own-and-operate portfolio spanning the United States and Australia.
• Megawatts Under Control -- Exceeds one gigawatt, representing over 140% sequential growth and nearly fivefold growth year over year, across contracted, in-construction, and operating assets.
• Annual Recurring EBITDA Run-Rate -- Management expects over $180 million, now ahead of prior plan, reflecting increased powered land and powered shell asset contributions to recurring cash flows.
• Pipeline -- Actively progressing $3.5 billion in opportunities tied to over 3.5 gigawatts, with developed pipeline value up from prior quarters.
• AI Infrastructure Segment Scale -- 100 megawatts of powered land and powered shell added, expected to generate $65 million recurring EBITDA over the next 12 to 18 months as those assets come online.
• Japan Market Entry -- Acquisition of an 850-megawatt development portfolio announced; 350 megawatts in advanced projects targeted for near-term closing and construction.
• 2026 Guidance Reaffirmed -- Full-year revenue maintained at $225 million to $300 million, with $75 million to $100 million from internal projects, 15%‑25% gross margin, and year-end cash of $150 million to $200 million.

SUMMARY

The call highlighted the acceleration of Energy Vault Holdings (NYSE:NRGV)'s transition to an integrated storage IPP and infrastructure platform, supported by substantial sequential and year-over-year growth in revenue, contracted backlog, and assets under control. Management stated, "Our backlog has grown to over $1.35 billion," with more than 80% linked to owned assets. Strong demand from the AI compute infrastructure sector drove new project additions and higher recurring EBITDA visibility. The company completed a major convertible debt raise, monetized ITC proceeds from new assets, and is expanding internationally, notably with a significant entry into Japan. The pipeline and backlog now ensure multi-year revenue and high-margin recurring cash flow visibility as own-and-operate projects are built and commissioned.

• Chief Financial Officer Michael Beer said, "Quarter to quarter there can be different mix components. A year ago we had significant IP-related contributions, so we had a 57% gross margin. This quarter, on an adjusted basis, it is about 28%; on a GAAP basis, about 22%," referencing shifts in project mix and IP-related revenue.
• Management reiterated a view that future gross margins for new IPP projects "shifting from the 20% to 25% range up to the 60% to 80% range for IPP-level margins." as backlog is executed over the next several years.
• AI-driven powered land and powered shell projects are projected to deliver "anywhere from 5x to 10x the EBITDA contribution per megawatt per year versus standalone storage," according to Robert Piconi.
• Michael Beer reported that the Japanese acquisition will follow a familiar ownership and financing model as U.S. and Australian assets, facilitated by an "existing team that we are effectively acqui-hiring, with a very robust portfolio."
• International diversification expanded to Japan and the Balkans, adding to presence in Australia, Switzerland, and the United States.
• Robust developed pipeline activity and conversion rates are expected to support ongoing revenue growth, even as the revenue recognition model adapts amid the shift to long-duration infrastructure ownership.
• The company is maintaining its focus on core U.S. Asia-Pacific, and select European markets and notes its supply chain remains adaptable amid global regulatory and tariff changes.

INDUSTRY GLOSSARY

• IPP (Independent Power Producer): A company or investor group that owns and operates power generation assets, selling electricity into wholesale or retail markets rather than primarily as a turnkey EPC contractor.
• BESS (Battery Energy Storage System): A system using batteries to store electricity for future dispatch, used in grid resilience and infrastructure projects.
• Powered Land / Powered Shell: Asset structures where land and/or facilities are delivered with grid interconnection and ready-to-use power infrastructure for end customers, commonly for AI data centers and digital infrastructure.
• Adjusted Gross Margin: Gross profit adjusted for non-cash items, such as depreciation and amortization, to better reflect ongoing project cash margins.
• Cap Call Structure: A derivative instrument linked to convertible debt offerings that increases the effective conversion price or limits potential dilution to shareholders.
• C.O.D. (Commercial Operation Date): The date when a project is constructed, energized, and begins regular revenue-generating operations under contract terms.

Full Conference Call Transcript

Michael Beer: Hello, and welcome to Energy Vault Holdings, Inc.'s First Quarter 2026 Financial Results Conference Call. As a reminder, Energy Vault Holdings, Inc.'s earnings press release and presentation are available now on our investor website, and we will be referring to the presentation during this call. A replay of this call will be available later today on the Investor Relations portion of our website. This call is now being recorded. If you object in any way, please disconnect now. Please note that Energy Vault Holdings, Inc.'s earnings release and this call contain forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties.

These forward-looking statements are only estimates and may differ materially from actual future events or results due to a variety of factors. Please refer to our most recent 10-K or 10-Q filing for a list of factors that could cause our results to differ from those anticipated in any forward-looking statement. We undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements except as required by law. In addition, please note that we will be presenting and discussing certain non-GAAP financial information. Please refer to the Safe Harbor disclaimer and non-GAAP financial measures presented in our earnings release for more details, including a reconciliation to comparable GAAP measures.

Joining me on this call today is Robert Piconi, our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. At this time, I would like to hand the call over to Robert.

Robert Piconi: Michael, thank you. And I would like to welcome everybody. Good afternoon, evening, and morning. I want to call it out front as well: the investor presentation that hopefully all of you by standard course download is on the website, and it would be great if you are listening in here to download that. I will be referring to some of the charts in that deck, in particular pages four through nine. We are providing even more transparency with some of the data, in particular as we have made this transition now to an integrated storage IPP.

And we will be providing more details in and around backlog, for example, and even looking at our comparable companies in what we are considering as a new peer set as we have made this transition. If you have seen the results by now, hopefully you will agree that this is a very strong validation of our shift into an energy infrastructure platform provider.

More than doubling our megawatt capacity under management from last quarter to over a gigawatt, the new project acquisitions that make that up, as designed, will ensure long-term, high-margin, and recurring revenue streams as reflected in the strong contract backlog growth that, as you see, is over $1.3 billion, made up primarily of our own-and-operate projects now—projects that are prefunded to our existing Asset Vault platform. We also see strong near-term demand growth for our AI compute infrastructure solutions integrating storage, generation, and under our unified software control. That strong historical execution capability—as we have delivered revenue and, in particular, in Q4 delivering over $150 million—we have earned this right with our customers.

That is enabling interim revenue upside potential while our larger-scale own-and-operate projects are being constructed and coming online in the coming 12, 24, and 36 months. With the move squarely now into the IPP and digital infrastructure company peer groups, as reflected by our current contracted backlog—and you can refer to page nine—we do believe a rerating here is going to help the valuation and the related upside to our current trading. Over the past 12 months, we have transitioned from a project-based provider into a fully integrated power and AI infrastructure platform. As we can see by the results, in the execution and scaling of our own-and-operate model, the quarter demonstrates that acceleration.

This is no longer a forward-looking transition. It is now visible across our backlog, our asset base, and our financial performance. In particular, it will, as it did last year in the latter half of the year, as revenue again scales. We are providing an integrated energy and power infrastructure platform that brings together not only energy storage, but also now generation components, and as always, our intelligent software platform that from inception was designed to handle any generation tech, whether that be gas or renewable, as well as any and all storage technologies to solve one of the most pressing challenges in the global economy today, and that is delivering reliable power quickly and at scale.

We integrate these capabilities and capital structures to build, own, and operate and in particular, as a vertically integrated IPP. What that means is we can be faster, we can be more cost effective—as our gross margins are showing and demonstrating at about 2x the market—and that comes from less friction in terms of cost and time and, at the end, delivers higher quality, achieving over 99% uptime across every one of our storage projects that are operating today. And we do this now and are solving what is the primary constraint across global markets, and that is access to power. The most important takeaway perhaps this quarter is we are accelerating that execution now of our own-and-operate model.

You can see that in three areas, as well as many other details that we are going to be providing on the call. Our portfolio now exceeds one gigawatt of assets under control—that is contracted, under construction, or already operating. Our backlog has grown to over $1.35 billion, and over 80% of that is tied to owned assets now, which is a shift over the last five quarters. And we now have visibility to over $180 million in recurring EBITDA run-rate, which is ahead of our plan, also reflecting the inclusion now of powered land and powered shell opportunities where we are owning assets providing power.

This has reflected a shift from more episodic project revenue to predictable long-term infrastructure cash flows. Importantly, we are executing ahead of that plan, and a lot of that is due to some of the dynamics we are seeing now in the AI infrastructure compute space. If you look at page four, which looks back from our Q4 2024 actuals, looks at our revenue and our backlog, and shows what that looked like at 2025—growing that backlog from about $400 million to $1.3 billion today. As well, it looks at our gross margin, which has improved from 13.5% just six quarters ago to almost 24% at 2025 and projecting close to 25% for this year.

If you look at the backward-looking view, we have executed the strategy and, if you look at our backlog at 80% own-and-operate, we are there. As highlighted in the press release, we delivered broad-based triple-digit growth—if you turn to slide five—across most all key metrics: revenue up over 150% year-over-year; backlog more than doubled, up 108%; adjusted gross profit up 25%; cash up 148%, reaching $117 million; and our megawatts, very importantly, under our control up almost 5x year-over-year and already more than doubled, up 140% sequentially. Every core metric—capacity, backlog, revenue, and our liquidity—is fulfilling what we outlined and what we demonstrated with our strategic shift from two years ago.

If you look at slide six, we have added this look at our backlog to take a look at where we have transitioned in just the last six quarters. What you see is a shift from what has historically been our energy storage EPC revenue, looking at our current backlog at $1.35 billion, towards primarily the long-term own-and-operate revenue streams. Importantly, the gross margins associated with that backlog will be fundamentally shifting as we build these projects and bring them online over the next 12, 24, and 36 months—those margins shifting from the 20% to 25% range up to the 60% to 80% range for IPP-level margins.

A lot of the growth that we are seeing, both in terms of the initial megawatts we have been adding and what we will be adding more in the future, is related to the AI data center space as well. That is powering a lot of the infrastructure investments, in particular in the U.S. Power availability is now the gating factor for expansion. We added 100 megawatts of powered land and powered shell just this quarter. That alone is expected to generate $65 million in recurring EBITDA in the next 12 to 18 months as that comes online. Beyond the primary power capacity, we are addressing resilience needs through energy storage systems that we deliver and operate.

If you go to page seven, just a reminder of that unit economics growth relative to our core standalone storage at the bottom of the metric, and then moving up to our powered land and powered shell, as well as the geographic expansion. The addition of powered land and powered shell for AI is helping drive our acceleration.

Very importantly, if you move to page eight, you can see that we are expanding where we are going, not only as we look at this quarter—you see expansion from 440 megawatts to over a gigawatt, as I mentioned previously—but looking out over the years, we are also increasing what we will have under management by 2030, reaching almost four gigawatts as we look at today and what we see in our funnels and our development pipeline and what we are executing that is already under our control.

You can see the EBITDA numbers there in those outer years get very large, and a lot of that work to achieve that is underway now as we are building and constructing these systems that are going to come online over the next two to three years. To finish on slide nine, I will highlight how the market is beginning to reframe Energy Vault Holdings, Inc., not as a traditional storage company, but as a broader power infrastructure platform. This evolution is critical as we expand into owning and operating integrated energy assets, particularly in support of the AI data center digital infrastructure.

Not all megawatts are valued the same, and hence our move into the AI digital infrastructure space is accelerating what we are delivering in our initial targets. We are moving into a category that commands structurally higher valuation multiples. The infrastructure platforms with predictable long-duration cash flows and low revenue volatility are valued differently from project-based businesses, and this shift is increasingly reflected in how investors benchmark this sector. Importantly, this repositioning supports a meaningful rerating opportunity. As we execute against our megawatt pipeline and bring assets under ownership control, we unlock the full value of the long-term contracted EBITDA streams. Successful execution of megawatts under control is the bridge to this value realization.

Our strong historical execution capabilities have earned us this right with our existing customers who want to work with us on new projects while enabling interim revenue upside while our larger-scale projects are being constructed and coming online. With this transition, we are firmly into the IPP and digital infrastructure peer groups, reflected in our contracted backlog now at about 80%. We believe this evolution is going to support the rerating and meaningful upside to our current trading levels. You will see in the chart how we have historically looked at our comp companies and looked at the performance both year-to-date this year as well as the trailing 12 months.

We have had very strong appreciation of the stock price if you go back one year ago, but also this year in our current trading. Most importantly, if you look at some of the new trading comps in the mid part of the page and the valuation multiples on the right, you will see the opportunity that we saw and why we made the strategic shift two years ago. To close, before I turn it over to Michael, who is going to get into some of the details of our results for the quarter: we are accelerating the execution of our own-and-operate strategy. The big increase in the megawatts under our management is a strong reflection of that.

We are also scaling a globally diversified infrastructure platform now over one gigawatt. That is important because things regionally can change—we saw that with the tariff environment just one year ago. Having exposure to markets like Australia and our recent acquisition of a large portfolio—850 megawatts in Japan, with 350 megawatts of near-term projects there—reflects the fact that we are expanding in the most attractive markets and will give us that global diversity, despite the tremendous opportunity here at home in the U.S. Energy Vault Holdings, Inc. today is not just participating in this transition; we are building the infrastructure backbone that enables it across the energy and power side, AI, and the industrial markets.

I also want to thank the Energy Vault Holdings, Inc. team for their dedication, passion, and commitment to executing our strategy every day. The results are a reflection of this. We are reiterating where we are going to be this year and the guidance we set six weeks ago. We feel very good about executing and believe there is a lot of upside within that guidance range. With that, I will turn it over to Michael Beer.

Michael Beer: Thanks, Rob. As you can see in the financial summary on slide 18, we delivered Q1 revenue of $21.9 million, representing a 150% increase year-over-year, driven by higher energy storage project deliveries and initial contributions from assets within our asset portfolio. Adjusted gross profit for the quarter was $6.1 million, up 25% year-over-year, with an adjusted gross margin of 27.9%. Adjusted gross profit reflects the removal of asset operating project-related depreciation and amortization as those projects commence operation in mid-2025. The prior year gross margin of 57.1% was highly skewed by IP-related revenue.

Adjusted EBITDA was negative $13.6 million in the period, compared to negative $11.3 million in the prior-year period, reflecting continued investments in our own-and-operate strategy, including development expense and organizational scaling to support long-term growth. Excluding one-time impacts from the extinguishment of debt and stock-based comp, Q1 2026 adjusted net income of negative $20 million compared to negative $11.8 million in the prior-year period due to higher D&A and personnel from the new O&O asset projects and associated project-related financing expense and interest. From a cash position and financing perspective, we ended the quarter with $117.1 million in total cash and cash equivalents, reflecting continued investment in our Asset Vault portfolio alongside strengthening financing activities.

As Rob mentioned, during the quarter we significantly enhanced our balance sheet through the successful completion of a $150 million convertible senior notes offering, which was upsized from $125 million. A portion of the proceeds was used to repay $45 million in higher-cost debt while also implementing a cap call structure with an implied conversion price of $8.12 per share. In addition, we began monetizing investment tax credits, completing approximately $12 million of net ITC transfers, with approximately $40 million in total ITC proceeds expected across all projects placed in service thus far. These actions collectively strengthen our liquidity position and provide the financing flexibility to accelerate execution of our global asset ownership strategy.

At the project level, management is in the market for the Sosa and Stony Creek project financings, which we expect to complete this quarter and in 2026, respectively. We are also evaluating a number of other financing opportunities, including those in support of our ramp in Japan and surrounding the powered land space. Turning to our latest backlog and development pipeline on slide 17, we exited the quarter with a record backlog of $1.35 billion, representing 108% year-over-year growth, with over 80% associated with our own-and-operate portfolio across the United States and Australia. This backlog provides strong multiyear revenue visibility and reflects continued traction in converting our developed pipeline into contracted projects.

From a commercial activity standpoint, we made meaningful progress expanding our global footprint and asset base: one, we advanced our U.S. portfolio with the acquisition of the 175-megawatt/350-megawatt-hour McMurtry BESS project in Texas; two, we announced entry into the Japan market, including the 850-megawatt development portfolio with 350 megawatts in advanced-stage projects expected to close this quarter; three, we have added a number of smaller projects in Switzerland and made headway with the opportunity in the Balkans; and four, we continue scaling our AI power infrastructure platform, including progress on the 75-megawatt powered land opportunity, where a number of agreements have now been secured.

Across our platform, total megawatts under control, in construction, or in operation now exceed one gigawatt, supporting a growing base of long-term recurring revenue opportunities. From a developed pipeline perspective, which we now view on a megawatt basis versus megawatt-hour, we are now actively progressing opportunities valued at $3.5 billion associated with over 3.5 gigawatts. Taken together, our advanced developed pipeline and contracted backlog provide strong visibility into the next phase of growth for the company. As we continue executing our strategy, we are seeing clear validation of our transition towards a vertically integrated build, own, and operate model.

Our global asset portfolio now exceeds one gigawatt and is expected to generate over $180 million in annual recurring EBITDA run-rate ahead of prior expectations. This positions us to deliver increasing levels of predictable, high-quality earnings as assets move into operation. Turning to our business outlook for 2026, we are reaffirming our full-year 2026 guidance, including revenue in the range of $225 million to $300 million, with approximately $75 million to $100 million in internal Asset Vault project builds, gross margin of 15% to 25%, and year-end cash in the range of $150 million to $200 million. This outlook reflects continued execution across our backlog, scaling contributions from owned and operated assets, and disciplined capital deployment.

With that, I will hand it back over to you, Rob.

Robert Piconi: Great, Michael. Thank you. I think with that, we will turn it over to the operator for any questions.

Operator: Thank you. We will now be conducting a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press 1 on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press 2 if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. As a reminder, please restrict yourself to one question and one follow-up. One moment while we poll for questions. The first question comes from the line of Justin Clare with Roth Capital Partners. Please go ahead.

Justin Clare: Hi. Thanks for taking our questions, and congrats on the growth in the backlog here. I wanted to start out on the AI infrastructure and the 100 megawatts of powered shell and powered land that you plan to complete over the next 12 to 18 months. Can you share more on the status of those projects? For example, how much of the 100 megawatts is contracted and has offtake versus how much is in negotiation? What is interconnection status? And where are you in terms of permitting those projects as well?

Robert Piconi: Thanks. We have announced 100 megawatts in powered land and powered shell. At our last earnings, we mentioned publicly the Southwest utility for the 75 megawatts of powered land that also is under a load study pre-application for 925 additional megawatts for a total of one gigawatt. The first 75 megawatts are already in construction and committed, and are going to be coming online in January. From the powered shell perspective, we have our already announced agreement with Crusoe. That is under development now. We have all the sites and all the load ready for that, and that is going to be constructed and will start to come online in Q4 this year.

That is where we are as far as powered land and powered shell. Most of those, and the opportunities that we are developing, are where you are going to see significant growth. If you look at page eight of the deck, you will see that mix shift. You will see the mix of powered land and powered shell versus our standalone storage increasing significantly between where we are today in March 2026 up through 2030, moving from roughly about 10% of that megawatt funnel to a little over half of it over the next few years. You can expect to see more announcements in that space.

Justin Clare: Great. Appreciate the detail there. On the $180 million of recurring EBITDA that is anticipated when you build out the backlog, what is the timing of that and how does it ramp over the next two to three years or so? And can you break down how much may be related to BESS projects versus how much is powered land and powered shell?

Michael Beer: We previously gave guidance in November around the overall size of the Asset Vault portfolio, initially targeting $150 million of recurring EBITDA. We have since announced our entry into Japan. We believe Japan is a 350-megawatt attractive late-stage portfolio, in addition to that guidance. And now we have given more fidelity around what we believe the contribution would be from powered land and powered shell—on the order of about $65 million in recurring EBITDA. So if you were to take the $150 million and remove the $65 million from powered land and powered shell, the increase beyond that is associated with the Japan portfolio. This is envisioned to be circa 2028 to early 2029.

Robert Piconi: And just to add, the reason we are seeing this acceleration—if you look at the unit economics—we looked at standalone storage IPP almost a year ago. As we have evolved and looked at the AI compute infrastructure space, those deals and those megawatts that we are contracting and owning are delivering anywhere from 5x to 10x the EBITDA contribution per megawatt per year versus standalone storage. That is why we are providing the breakdown around the mix shift. As we add more of those, you can expect continual acceleration in annualized recurring EBITDA. If you look at the chart on page eight, you will see where we expect that to go, and we have increased that since last quarter.

Justin Clare: Okay. Got it. Thank you. I will pass it on.

Operator: The next question comes from the line of Derek Soderberg with Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead.

Derek Soderberg: Hey, thanks for taking the questions. First one on gross margins: guidance looks like 15% to 25% for the year. What are some of the variables—battery cell pricing, project mix—that will determine where you land in that range? As of today, where do you think you are tracking—lower end, higher end?

Michael Beer: Quarter to quarter there can be different mix components. A year ago we had significant IP-related contributions, so we had a 57% gross margin. This quarter, on an adjusted basis, it is about 28%; on a GAAP basis, about 22%. We are tracking to be better than the midpoint of guidance. You will have a very back-end-loaded revenue year associated with project deliveries. We are still in the EPC business, and the fourth quarter will be heavily influenced by some of those deliveries. Those deliveries can balance out the overall shape of the year and the total gross margin profile.

We are very confident around the overall range and endeavor to do better than the midpoint, as we did last year.

Robert Piconi: The other thing I would add is our new gross margins and revenue that include the storage IPP will, from a GAAP perspective, include the non-cash portions of depreciation. That is why we are referring to adjusted gross margin, which is really getting at the cash gross margin only, so you can compare apples to apples with EPC revenue. If you do it that way, we are closer to 27.8% to 27.9% this quarter. We will focus on execution and managing our supply chain. We continue to set ranges that we are comfortable we can hit, and we will push execution to remain on the upside.

Derek Soderberg: Got it, that is helpful. As my follow-up—on the first 75 megawatts on the powered land piece coming online in January and then the 25 megawatts coming online in Q4 of this year—can you provide detail on how revenue and EBITDA will scale? And on the opportunity to potentially go up to a gigawatt on that higher EBITDA-per-megawatt opportunity, what milestones need to be hit?

Robert Piconi: The 75 megawatts are committed to be online in January. Transmission buildout is underway, and we have made payments and are committed. You will see an offtake agreement for that 75 megawatts; once it turns on in January, it should be fully monetized. We should get almost a full year of EBITDA there, estimated at somewhere around $35 million. On the 25 megawatts of powered shell, we will start deliveries in Q4—so not all 25 megawatts will land in Q4—and then come online over the next 12 to 18 months. The good news is we expect, in 12 to 18 months, to have roughly $65 million up and running on an annualized run-rate basis across powered land and powered shell.

Regarding the 75 megawatts scaling to a gigawatt: there is a study underway with the Southwest utility looking at the addition of 925 megawatts to that 75, for a total of one gigawatt. We do expect somewhere around $0.5 million per megawatt in EBITDA on that. Decisions on sizing of the capacity upgrade—transmission and high-voltage equipment—are expected in the next three to six months, with buildout over the next 24, 36, 48 months.

We are also looking at an interim step with other generation equipment coupled with our storage to bring online another 225 megawatts to add to the 75 megawatts within the powered land segment over the next 18 to 24 months, ahead of the 925 megawatts of grid power in the next 36-plus months. So, timeline summary: 75 megawatts in January; then, within 18 to 24 months, another 225 megawatts on an interim basis; then the additional 925 megawatts over 36-plus months.

Derek Soderberg: Appreciate the detail. Thanks.

Operator: Thank you. Next question comes from the line of Brian Lee with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Tyler Bisson: Hey, this is Tyler Bisson on for Brian. Thanks for taking our questions. First, on the margins in terms of the backlog—what is the timeline to reach the 60% to 80% IPP margins as you execute on the backlog? And to confirm, this would be on an adjusted basis?

Michael Beer: Yes. Over time, obviously there are two distinct margin profiles for our businesses. The 20% to 25% is akin to the legacy EPC-related business. The transition to the IPP business model is the 60% to 80% IPP margins, as laid out on slide six. There will be a mix effect over time as projects come online. We are not exiting the EPC business; we will continue to do that for third-party customers and self-perform for ourselves, which also has a positive working capital function. So it will be a blending over time, not a flip of a switch.

Tyler Bisson: Helpful. Can you provide an update on your revenue trajectory for the balance of the year? Noticed accounts receivable stepped down this quarter—could you see 2Q revenues decreasing quarter-over-quarter? How are you thinking about the balance of the year from a revenue standpoint?

Michael Beer: We generally do not give quarterly guidance in that respect, but as mentioned, it will be a back-end-loaded year. I would use a profile akin to what you saw last year.

Robert Piconi: As you saw there, we had very strong year-over-year compares, and we are projecting over 30% growth at the midpoint this year. If you look at the trajectory and that framework, we are expecting something similar. Generally, year-over-year compares should be favorable as we ramp and scale.

Tyler Bisson: Understood. One more: more details on the progress on the developed pipeline and backlog. It looks like developed pipeline increased to 3.2 gigawatts from 1.8 gigawatts last quarter, but the value went up to $3.5 billion from $3 billion. On the backlog, it looks like it remained flat at three gigawatt-hours, but the value went up slightly. Can you discuss the moving pieces?

Michael Beer: There are always ins and outs—FX and other items can move these at the margin. Within developed pipeline, we are starting to see real benefits of the integrated model. While we are in both EPC and IPP, we are seeing opportunities emerge that split the difference and emerge from both camps. Having a team focused on both sides is additive. We add new projects all the time and also cull the developed pipeline to remove stale items. We try to keep this very current. This reflects the current slate of investments in the U.S. across multiple industry subsegments, and we are seeing other things emerge internationally.

Robert Piconi: Another perspective: when we decided to focus on owning and operating—acquiring megawatts and then building them—the revenue does not come during build; it comes at COD. Normally, with that shift, you might expect revenue to go down over a 12 to 24 month period. We challenged the team to keep recognized revenue growth going until these new projects come online. Despite the shift and the activity we are not recognizing—Energy Vault Holdings, Inc. is building projects for Asset Vault that do not show up in recognized revenue—we are still projecting strong double-digit revenue growth in 2026.

Much of this is driven by the U.S. market with AI infrastructure power packages, integrating our energy storage with generation—gas generation, for example—and UPS backups, integrated through a single software platform. These are solutions we sell and turn over, enabling revenue recognition in parallel. That is allowing us to maintain revenue growth while focusing on these solutions. A lot of that has come from customers that know us and trust us, with systems running at 99%+ availability. We feel good about the revenue projections for growth this year and see upside to current projections as well.

Tyler Bisson: Thank you very much. I will turn it over.

Operator: Thank you. Next question comes from the line of Sid Ranci with Fundamental Research Corp. Please go ahead. Hi. Congratulations on the strong results. How are Calistoga and Cross Train operations performing given it has been almost 12 months since both started operating? Are revenue and margins there in line with your expectations?

Michael Beer: The Crossroads project continues to perform well. There has not been a change, and we are expecting on the order of circa $10 million in EBITDA on a full-year basis across CRC and CrossFails.

Robert Piconi: I would add that anyone in the IPP market knows ERCOT has been undergoing cyclical weakness over the last 12 to 24 months versus the prior year. The good news is our system there in ERCOT has been running at 99% availability despite that, and we will take advantage of opportunities when they come. That softness has made it a buyer’s market when acquiring megawatts, which is an opportunity. We have been very careful in selecting the best points of interconnect and doing diligence to have strong interconnects, as is the case with McMurtry that we announced just north of Dallas, at points where we believe we can leverage good economics.

Siddharth Rajeev: Great. Thank you for that. With the ownership structure of the Japanese initiative, will that be similar to your other assets given you are partnering with a local developer there?

Robert Piconi: Yes. The Japanese market is fascinating because if you go back four to five years, it looks like where ERCOT was then. We see Japan evolving into a similar economic environment with opportunities to deploy for frequency and other ancillary services and arbitrage. Structurally, the initial team we are acquiring—from an existing large company—will continue developing the near-term projects. Of the 850 megawatts within that portfolio, 350 megawatts are near-term projects that we expect to close this quarter and then construct and get up and operating. From a financing perspective, it will be similar to how we look at projects in the U.S. and Australia.

One difference is a favorable interest rate environment in Japan that will be helpful, and there are well-known project financing models as well.

Michael Beer: It is an existing team that we are effectively acqui-hiring, with a very robust portfolio. We will be going to market from a financing perspective in support of those projects. We entered Australia a few short years ago and generated a lot of traction; we are looking to replicate that in Japan.

Siddharth Rajeev: Any comments on the offtake pricing you can get there? Is the ROI comparable to the U.S., or higher?

Michael Beer: We have not given specifics. It is an attractive market, and we feel we are early. We have not provided those specifics.

Robert Piconi: We are expecting low double-digit type IRRs as we get started there, with opportunity for optimization. Hence our investment—today and over the coming years we believe Japan will be an attractive market.

Operator: Thank you. Next question comes from the line of Noel Parks with Tuohy Brothers. Please go ahead. Hi. Good afternoon. I had a couple. You mentioned gas generation a moment ago in serving the landscape of potential business for your pipeline. What is the main pain point for potential customers? Is there a difference between new AI-related generation where gas is probably at the core versus situations playing catch-up with wind and solar for grid integration? Is one a much bigger driver than the other?

Robert Piconi: Good question. You are hearing more about gas for two reasons. First, power demand largely outstrips supply and the ability to deliver it. Any and all solutions—solar, wind—combined with other types of generation are needed, and leveraging abundant natural gas in the U.S., gas will play an important component, particularly over the next three to five years plus. Second, data centers require five-nines reliability. Think back to the Texas freeze event that shut things down for days. With five-nines SLAs for AI compute infrastructure, you need redundancy and often multiple redundancies.

You can have a grid connection and add energy storage, which is good for hours and even up to a day, but for multi-day outages you need reciprocating engines or gas/diesel gensets. A solution with grid power plus energy storage plus gas backup can deliver five-nines. With the massive CapEx in data center buildouts, a lot of that is essentially guaranteeing power availability and delivery. That is why you see the numbers.

Noel Parks: That makes sense. You touched on Japan compared to where ERCOT was a few years ago. When you announced the Japan acquisition, you stressed the importance of grid stability and load balancing in Japan. Could you dig into that a bit deeper and whether there are analogous regions that might need to deal with this sooner rather than later?

Robert Piconi: The perspectives we shared from the announcement stand. We expect to see fast frequency response, load balancing, and opportunities to capture different types of pricing at different times of day. Generally, that dynamic is positive for the market, and others entering see the same. As far as other markets with similar dynamics, Asia-Pac is a great example with other markets that may have similar environmental factors. We also look at scale and priority in choosing markets and avoid spreading ourselves too thin. There are other markets with those characteristics, including some newer European growth markets.

But we are very focused on the largest opportunities and focusing our capital and human resources where we see the biggest upside—much of that is in the U.S.

Noel Parks: Thanks. One more: thinking about the process of project financing—over the last couple of years you have seen a transition to getting financing much earlier in a project’s life cycle. As you negotiate and arrange financing for upcoming projects, is there less of an education burden with counterparties, or does everyone still need to go through a similar process?

Michael Beer: The market is evolving quickly. Where nobody would have looked at merchant years ago, now that is being incorporated into models and people are creative in structuring bridges or construction financing around some of the IPCs. We see that in the U.S. and it is bleeding into Australia and likely Japan, though we need to go through that process. We have now done this a few times and know what we are looking for as we evaluate project attractiveness and what can go wrong—mitigating risk where possible, bringing partners in earlier, and building a feedback loop of existing partners so we can rinse and repeat across the portfolio and remove friction where possible.

Noel Parks: Terrific. Good to hear.

Operator: Thanks. Ladies and gentlemen, we have reached the end of the question and answer session. I would now like to turn the floor over to Robert Piconi for closing comments.

Robert Piconi: Great, operator. Thank you. In closing, and hopefully you have gone through the numbers and charts—I again encourage everyone to download those—we are sharing more detail and transparency on factors that tie to future profitability and growth. Key metrics we shared—the growth in megawatts under management that more than doubled since we last spoke just six or seven weeks ago, getting over that first gigawatt within our control to execute—these are not small markers. On top of that, the backlog—$1.3 billion—with 80% now contracted at much higher IPP-type gross margins should give investors comfort relative to future profitability as we bring those online.

Operationally, the execution we have had—last year began with tariffs and uncertainty through the first half and mid-year—yet the team at Energy Vault Holdings, Inc. executed and delivered, the only energy storage company to deliver on the original guidance we set for the year, and in a strong way in the quarter, delivering positive EBITDA in that last quarter. We are expecting to do the same this year, with strong execution, and expect to have continual positive and upside surprises given our market penetration, particularly in the U.S. We are staying very focused on three core segments and very attractive core markets—Asia-Pac (Australia and Japan), Europe where we are developing interesting own-and-operate opportunities, and, in particular, the U.S.

It has required a nimble, diverse, and dynamic supply chain given changes in rules and the focus on domestic solutions. Our supply chain has been nimble, as demonstrated in Q4. With what we have under contract and under development within our control, and with the opportunities—our developed pipeline has more than doubled since we last spoke six weeks ago—these are important markers. We have had a very good conversion rate taking the developed pipeline and converting those megawatts into things within our control, meaning acquiring attractive points of interconnect.

These are markers investors should look at relative to the future, with a proven team that has been able to execute and deliver for customers at extremely high availability—99%+—which is how we are being judged by customers. Finally, none of this happens by itself. We have a nimble, agile, hardworking, do-whatever-it-takes team at Energy Vault Holdings, Inc. I want to thank all the employees who make these results happen, who are passionate about delivering for customers and maintaining our focus on sustainability—as we announced this past quarter, two years in a row now being ranked the number one energy storage company and number one energy company in our industry from a sustainability score judged by S&P Global.

True to our mission and vision, I could not be prouder of the team and where we are today. I have never felt better about where this company is going to go and what we are going to achieve. There is no shortage of capital to put behind strong management teams in an attractive space with a proven track record of delivery, and we hit on all those fronts. With that, operator, I am completed with the call. I will turn it back to you.

Operator: Thank you. This concludes today’s teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.

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