Investors might want to bet on Asana, Inc. (ASAN - Free Report) , as it has been recently upgraded to a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). This upgrade is essentially a reflection of an upward trend in earnings estimates -- one of the most powerful forces impacting stock prices.
The Zacks rating relies solely on a company's changing earnings picture. It tracks EPS estimates for the current and following years from the sell-side analysts covering the stock through a consensus measure -- the Zacks Consensus Estimate.
Individual investors often find it hard to make decisions based on rating upgrades by Wall Street analysts, since these are mostly driven by subjective factors that are hard to see and measure in real time. In these situations, the Zacks rating system comes in handy because of the power of a changing earnings picture in determining near-term stock price movements.
Therefore, the Zacks rating upgrade for Asana basically reflects positivity about its earnings outlook that could translate into buying pressure and an increase in its stock price.
Most Powerful Force Impacting Stock PricesThe change in a company's future earnings potential, as reflected in earnings estimate revisions, and the near-term price movement of its stock are proven to be strongly correlated. The influence of institutional investors has a partial contribution to this relationship, as these big professionals use earnings and earnings estimates to calculate the fair value of a company's shares. An increase or decrease in earnings estimates in their valuation models simply results in higher or lower fair value for a stock, and institutional investors typically buy or sell it. Their transaction of large amounts of shares then leads to price movement for the stock.
Fundamentally speaking, rising earnings estimates and the consequent rating upgrade for Asana imply an improvement in the company's underlying business. Investors should show their appreciation for this improving business trend by pushing the stock higher.
Harnessing the Power of Earnings Estimate RevisionsAs empirical research shows a strong correlation between trends in earnings estimate revisions and near-term stock movements, tracking such revisions for making an investment decision could be truly rewarding. Here is where the tried-and-tested Zacks Rank stock-rating system plays an important role, as it effectively harnesses the power of earnings estimate revisions.
The Zacks Rank stock-rating system, which uses four factors related to earnings estimates to classify stocks into five groups, ranging from Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) to Zacks Rank #5 (Strong Sell), has an impressive externally-audited track record, with Zacks Rank #1 stocks generating an average annual return of +25% since 1988. You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here >>>> .
Earnings Estimate Revisions for AsanaThis company is expected to earn $0.38 per share for the fiscal year ending January 2027, which represents no year-over-year change.
Analysts have been steadily raising their estimates for Asana. Over the past three months, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for the company has increased 25.2%.
Bottom LineUnlike the overly optimistic Wall Street analysts whose rating systems tend to be weighted toward favorable recommendations, the Zacks rating system maintains an equal proportion of "buy" and "sell" ratings for its entire universe of more than 4,000 stocks at any point in time. Irrespective of market conditions, only the top 5% of the Zacks-covered stocks get a "Strong Buy" rating and the next 15% get a "Buy" rating. So, the placement of a stock in the top 20% of the Zacks-covered stocks indicates its superior earnings estimate revision feature, making it a solid candidate for producing market-beating returns in the near term.
You can learn more about the Zacks Rank here >>>
The upgrade of Asana to a Zacks Rank #2 positions it in the top 20% of the Zacks-covered stocks in terms of estimate revisions, implying that the stock might move higher in the near term.
Software-as-a-service company Asana (ASAN +3.88%) has shed more than 40% of its value year to date and is a far cry from the $100-plus per share it commanded during the pandemic. Some investors view most dips as buying opportunities, but in this case, you shouldn't.
Image source: Getty Images.
Growth has been decelerating lately Asan's main product is a work and project management platform that leans on AI automation. The stock trades now at a price-to-sales ratio slightly above 2, but the company's lack of profitability and meaningful revenue growth deceleration should be enough to keep savvy investors from accumulating shares. Revenue rose by 9.5% year over year in the company's fiscal 2027 first quarter, which ended on April 30.
Today's Change
(
3.88
%) $
0.28
Current Price
$
7.49
Growth rates looked better in previous years. Asana delivered 9% year-over-year revenue growth in its fiscal 2026 first quarter and 13% revenue growth in its fiscal 2025 first quarter. You'd have to go back to Asana's fiscal 2024 to find a first-quarter growth rate above 20%.
Chief Financial Officer Aziz Megji made a point of mentioning the company's "momentum in AI product adoption," but not every AI stock is a winner. Asana is only projecting revenue growth of up to 9.2% in its fiscal 2027 second quarter. That's the same maximum growth rate Asana anticipates for its full fiscal 2027.
Asana does not have pricing power Asana's workflow tools help organizations efficiently assign tasks, but it's far from the only competitor in the space. Atlassian (TEAM +3.44%) competes with Asana through its Trello and Jira products. Microsoft offers a directly competing product, Microsoft Planner, which is included as a bonus in most Microsoft 365 plans. Alphabet has Google Sheets, Tasks, and Calendars, which can help with some task management.
Atlassian is also growing faster than Asana. The former posted 32% year-over-year revenue growth in its fiscal 2026 third quarter, which ended on March 31. If Asana had that growth rate, the conversation around the stock would be very different. However, the fact that a peer has much higher growth rates adds to the argument that investors should be cautious about buying Asana stock.
All this competition, particularly from big tech players, also limits Asana's ability to raise prices. While cost management has gotten the company closer to breakeven, those moves are short-term profitability drivers. Eventually, the slow revenue growth will impose a tight ceiling on how much Asana can expand its profit margins.
The company improved its generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) operating loss from 23% of its revenue in its fiscal 2026 first quarter to only 7% of revenue in its fiscal 2027 first quarter. In that light, the point at which it could reach profitability appears to be getting much closer, but those tepid growth rates suggest that investors should exercise caution with this stock.
Marc Guberti has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Alphabet, Atlassian, and Microsoft. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
A view shows the building of Norway’s central bank (Norges Bank) in Oslo, Norway, June 23, 2022. REUTERS/Victoria Klesty Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab
CompaniesCOPENHAGEN, July 7 (Reuters) - Norway's sovereign wealth fund, the world's largest, said on Tuesday it signed a deal with retail real estate investment firm Asana Partners for a strategic partnership in which it will own a 49% stake.
Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM) said in a statement it has made an equity commitment of $500 million, and that the partnership will invest in open-air shopping centers and street retail across the U.S.
Get a look at the day ahead in U.S. and global markets with the Morning Bid U.S. newsletter. Sign up here.
NBIM signed the deal on June 30, it added.
Reporting by Louise Rasmussen, editing by Essi Lehto
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab
SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Asana, Inc. (NYSE: ASAN) (LTSE: ASAN) announced today that Asana Gov has achieved FedRAMP® Moderate Authorization, enabling public sector organizations to coordinate critical initiatives and core operations with greater clarity, accountability, and visibility across programs while meeting federal security and compliance requirements.The authorization marks an important milestone in Asana's commitment to the public sector and reflects years of investment in meeting.
Asana, Inc. (NYSE: ASAN - Get Free Report)'s stock price reached a new 52-week low during trading on Friday. The stock traded as low as $6.31 and last traded at $6.3850, with a volume of 544955 shares traded. The stock had previously closed at $6.68. Analysts Set New Price Targets Several equities analysts recently issued
Software-as-a-service stocks powered portfolios for a decade on predictable revenue and fat margins. Then AI arrived. Tools that write code, design interfaces, and automate workflows triggered the so-called SaaS-pocalypse in early 2026. The iShares Expanded Tech-Software Sector ETF (CBOE:IGV) has fallen 35% from its October peak, with even companies posting double-digit growth watching investors flee.
However, three software application stocks stand amongst the hardest hit from their 52-week highs: Figma (NYSE:FIG), down 86.5%; Duolingo (NASDAQ:DUOL | DUOL Price Prediction), off 83.3%; and Monday.com (NASDAQ:MNDY), lower by 80.2%. Here is why these three once high-flying names have been decimated.
Figma (FIG) Figma’s stock traded as high as $142.92 in the past 52 weeks, but now sits below $20 per share for an 86.5% drop. Even so, growth remains robust.
Figma’s fourth-quarter and full-year 2025 results showed full-year revenue of $1.06 billion, up 41% year-over-year. Fourth-quarter revenue alone reached $303.8 million, also up 40%, while international revenue rose 45%. Adjusted free cash flow for the quarter hit $38.5 million, delivering a 13% margin, and full-year free cash flow totaled $237 million.
Yet the company stays unprofitable. Figma’s trailing 12-month P/E stands at a loss-making negative 7.39, with net losses for the year exceeding $1.25 billion. Compare that to peer Adobe (NASDAQ:ADBE), which generated 10% revenue growth in its latest quarter and throws off roughly $10 billion in annual free cash flow. It trades at a P/E of 13.3 and 3.8 times sales. Figma, by contrast, grows nearly four times faster but commands 9.5 times sales.
Figma guided first-quarter 2026 revenue to $315 million to $317 million (38% growth at the midpoint) and full-year 2026 to $1.366 billion to $1.374 billion (30% growth). That is deceleration, but still triple Adobe’s pace. It is clear investors are pricing in the risk that AI could erode Figma’s moat faster than expected.
Duolingo (DUOL) Duolingo peaked near $544.93, but shares now hover just below $90 a stub, an 83.3% decline. Its numbers, though, still impress. Duolingo reported full-year revenue of $1.038 billion, up 39%, and Q4 revenue rose 35% to $282.9 million. Total bookings climbed 33% to $1.158 billion, as daily active users reached 52.7 million, up 30%. Free cash flow for the year totaled $360.4 million and net income hit $414.1 million, though a $256.7 million one-time tax benefit boosted the figure. Adjusted EBITDA margin expanded to 29.8% in the quarter.
That said, 2026 guidance disappointed. The company forecast bookings growth of just 10% to 12%, well below the 24% posted in Q4. Duolingo’s trailing P/E sits around 10.3.
In a sector where peers like Coursera (NYSE:COUR) trade at similar multiples but with slower user growth, Duolingo’s valuation reset reflects investor skepticism that AI language tools will cap subscriber expansion. The stock’s drop in value prices in that risk.
Monday.com (MNDY) Monday.com reached $316.98 at its 52-week high and is now down 80.2%, trading near $62.50 per share, although its fundamentals hold steady. Trailing 12-month revenue stands at $1.23 billion, with net income of $118.74 million and EPS of $2.24. Free cash flow reached $309.9 million for the period ending Dec. 31, up 4.8% year-over-year, and the net dollar retention rate held at 111% in the quarter. Its P/E ratio equals 27.9x. The company set full-year 2026 revenue guidance at $1.452 billion to $1.462 billion, implying 18% to 19% growth.
That’s slower than the triple-digit growth of prior years, but it outpaces many mature SaaS names. Compared to Asana (NYSE:ASAN), Monday.com’s retention and cash generation look stronger, yet the market applied the same discount across the board.
No matter how you slice it, these three stocks illustrate the SaaS-pocalypse in action. Strong revenue, user gains, and cash flow failed to protect them from AI-driven repricing. It seems unlikely these stocks will regain their former highs anytime soon — if ever — but the fear discount baked into their stocks looks overdone for patient risk-tolerant investors.
Investors felt like it was 2021 all over again when shares of Avis Budget Group NASDAQ: CAR soared from $100 to $850 in just over three weeks.
No announcement or breakthrough caused the surge; just a classic short squeeze story involving an artificially-limited float and unbridled risk-seeking behavior.
Get Groupon alerts:
The squeeze was orchestrated by a pair of hedge funds that effectively gained control of the entire float. Through stock and swaps, Pentwater Capital and SRS Investment Management controlled more than 80% of the float in a stock already seeing 13% short interest.
As a result, basically no shares were available for shorts to cover, and the feedback loop sent the stock up more than 500%. Like most short squeezes, the trade quickly unwound, and CAR shares are back in the low $200's. But this episode was a great refresher on short-squeeze mechanics and also could set the stage for the next batch of squeezes.
3 Stocks With High Short Interest That Could Squeeze NextA true short squeeze requires three elements: a high level of short interest, a lengthy days to cover period, and a catalyst that can ignite a rally.
High short interest, with more than 5 days to cover, may create a difficult environment for short sellers to locate shares to close their positions. And when shorts are scrambling to cover while buyers pour in, that’s when the feedback loop of the short squeeze really sets in. Here are three stocks that match these criteria.
Groupon: Clean Short Squeeze Setup With Upcoming Earnings CatalystGroupon Today
$16.87 +0.78 (+4.85%)
As of 06/11/2026 04:00 PM Eastern
52-Week Range$9.17▼
$43.08Price Target$28.67
Online discounting marketplace Groupon Inc. NASDAQ: GRPN is always a popular short-squeeze candidate thanks to its earnings volatility and its general inability to turn revenue into profit.
And the shorts have mostly been rewarded over the years as GRPN shares have lost more than 65% of their value over the last five years.
But heavily shorted stocks often provide brief windows of opportunity, and Groupon has the classic short-squeeze setup that traders often seek.
First, GRPN has more than 50% of its float sold short, up more than 5% from the previous month. The stock entered the year with about 40% of the float sold short, so this is an acceleration from earlier levels. And crucially, shorts would need roughly 11.3 days to cover under average trading volume, which opens a lengthy window for a short squeeze to materialize.
In addition to the classic high short interest plus high days to cover combo, Groupon has a catalyst on the horizon with its Q1 2026 earnings release on May 6. An upside surprise could put more pressure on shorts, as the stock has already popped more than 30% in the last month.
Ignore the recent pullback; the Relative Strength Index (RSI) and Moving Average Convergence Divergence (MACD) indicator both show swelling buying momentum ahead of the earnings catalyst.
Asana: Founder Control Shrinks the Tradable SupplyAsana Today
$7.48 -0.11 (-1.39%)
As of 06/11/2026 03:59 PM Eastern
This is a fair market value price provided by Massive. Learn more.
52-Week Range$5.38▼
$15.71Price Target$9.27
Asana Inc. NYSE: ASAN is the work management software platform founded by Dustin Moskovitz, one of the original designers of Facebook and a tech sector staple.
The company has struggled to achieve profitability over its nearly two decades of operations, but recently posted back-to-back positive EPS figures in fiscal Q3 and Q4 2026.
It also posted record revenue of $205.57 million in Q4 2026, which represented more than 9% year-over-year (YOY) growth. Sentiment may be turning in Asana; the stock received a rare upgrade from the Royal Bank of Canada in early April, and the share price has been trending up for the last few weeks.
Nearly 35% of the float is sold short in ASAN, with about 4.2 days to cover. That combo is already an intriguing short-squeeze setup, but Moskovitz’s controlling stake is so large that it artificially reduces the number of shares available for trading. He’s also been a relentless buyer during downturns, creating a dynamic similar to what unfolded at Avis.
Short interest is at its highest level since 2022, but indicators like the RSI and MACD suggest selling pressure is subsiding, and a steady influx of buyers could be the catalyst to ignite the squeeze.
Few stocks have incinerated capital like Beyond Meat Inc. NASDAQ: BYND, which is down more than 99% since its 2019 IPO.
But that hasn’t stopped management from trying new things, and a few catalysts have the stock actually up more than 30% this month.
First, the company announced a partnership with Big Geyser for a protein-enhanced sports drink called Beyond Immerse. It also launched a new line of breakfast sausages and spicy chicken pieces, the latter to be sold exclusively at Kroger NYSE: KR.
With more than 31% of the float sold short and about 4.0 days to cover, the stock has the technical underpinnings for a short squeeze. A bullish MACD crossover triggered a trend reversal in early April, and now the RSI is back in bullish territory for the first time since early March. The company reports earnings on May 6, so another potential catalyst is waiting in the wings.
Should You Invest $1,000 in Groupon Right Now?Before you consider Groupon, you'll want to hear this.
MarketBeat keeps track of Wall Street's top-rated and best performing research analysts and the stocks they recommend to their clients on a daily basis. MarketBeat has identified the five stocks that top analysts are quietly whispering to their clients to buy now before the broader market catches on... and Groupon wasn't on the list.
While Groupon currently has a Hold rating among analysts, top-rated analysts believe these five stocks are better buys.
View The Five Stocks Here
Click the link to see MarketBeat's guide to investing in 5G and which 5G stocks show the most promise.
SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Asana, Inc. (NYSE: ASAN)(LTSE: ASAN), the system of action for work where humans and AI collaborate, announced today that it will release financial results for the first quarter fiscal year 2027 on Thursday, May 28, after the close of the U.S. markets. In conjunction with the announcement, the company will host a webcast on the same day at 1:30 p.m. Pacific time (4:30 p.m. Eastern time) to discuss the financial results. The live webcast and replay will be availab.
SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Asana, Inc. (NYSE: ASAN)(LTSE: ASAN), the operating system for human-agent teams, today announced it has completed the acquisition of StackAI. StackAI is a no-code AI workflow platform that enables companies to design, test, deploy and govern custom AI agents and intelligent automation of business-critical workflows. The platform connects workflows, data, and actions across enterprise systems such as ERP, CRM and ITSM, to automate operational processes like custo.
SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Asana, Inc. (NYSE: ASAN)(LTSE: ASAN), the operating system for human-agent teams, today reported financial results for its first quarter fiscal 2027 ended April 30, 2026. “Asana is the operating system for human-agent teams,” said Dan Rogers, Chief Executive Officer of Asana. “We believe the real enterprise productivity unlock from AI comes when humans and agents work together across the critical workflows that run the business. Customers are increasingly using A.
Asana has acquired the workflow automation company StackAI for $75 million, part of a larger effort to position itself as an AI-native workplace platform. StackAI’s founders, Tony Rosinol and Bernard Aceituno, will join Asana as part of the acquisition.
Asana framed the acquisition as part of its broader AI pivot, in which it seeks to build its platform into “the operating system for human-agent teams.”
The announcement was announced Thursday afternoon to coincide with Asana’s earnings and investor call.
Built as an AI workflow-automation system, StackAI designs agents to operate within existing business systems, pulling in data from systems like Salesforce, Slack, and Gsuite. Part of Y Combinator’s Winter ’23 cohort, the company has faced fierce competition from automation tools like Zapier as well as AI labs like OpenAI and Anthropic.
StackAI had raised just under $20 million, according to PitchBook data, with most of it coming in a recent $16 million Series A round. That round included funding from Gradient, Epakon Capital, Lobby VC, LifeX Ventures, and Vercel CEO Guillermo Rauch.
While users are likely most familiar with Asana’s work management system, the company has released a number of AI-oriented products in recent years, most notably the AI Studio automation builder and AI Teammates series of pre-built agents. While equivalent tools are available from major labs, Asana sees its deep integration into existing corporate workflows as a key advantage, allowing it to distill context and training data that would otherwise be unavailable.
Asana has struggled on public markets during the AI era, losing more than half its market cap value since the introduction of ChatGPT — a spiral that grew worse with the departure of founder Dustin Moskovitz as CEO last March. But revenue has continued to grow steadily, and the new leadership is confident that its human-agent products will enable it to rebound.
“This acquisition accelerates our roadmap and takes us into the next phase of human-agent work,” said CEO Dan Rogers in a statement. “We’re already seeing real momentum with AI Teammates and AI Studio … StackAI now lets them go further, agentifying the most complex business processes end-to-end.”
When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence.
Russell Brandom has been covering the tech industry since 2012, with a focus on platform policy and emerging technologies. He previously worked at The Verge and Rest of World, and has written for Wired, The Awl and MIT’s Technology Review. He can be reached at [email protected] or on Signal at 412-401-5489.
• Asana shares are powering higher. Why are ASAN shares rallying?
The company reported first-quarter revenue of $205.1 million, up 9.5% year-over-year. The revenue beat a Street consensus estimate of $203.6 million, according to data from Benzinga Pro.
The company reported earnings of 10 cents per share in the quarter, beating a Street consensus estimate of seven cents per share.
Asana reported record GAAP and non-GAAP operating margins in the first quarter.
"The business continues to show improving fundamentals, supported by momentum in AI product adoption, customer expansion, and operating efficiency," Asana Chief Financial Officer Aziz Megji said.
Asana had 26,103 Core customers, who spend at least $5,000 or more on an annualized basis, at the end of the quarter. This figure was up 7% year-over-year. Revenue from Core customers was up 10% year-over-year in the quarter.
Customers who spend $100,000 or more on an annualized basis with Asana were 817 in the quarter, up 12% year-over-year.
StackAI AcquisitionAlongside quarterly earnings, Asana announced the acquisition of StackAI. The acquisition is expected to add cross-system execution for human-agent teams.
"StackAI is a no-code AI workflow platform that enables companies to design, test, deploy and govern custom AI agents and intelligent automation of business-critical workflows," the company said.
StackAI offers end-to-end operations with multi-agent workflows and compatibility in Salesforce, AWS, Docusign, Oracle, document systems and industry applications, the company added.
Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.
"The acquisition of StackAI further differentiates our operating system for human-agent teams and reinforces our confidence in Asana's long-term growth and profitability potential," Megji said.
Asana CEO Dan Rogers said the acquisition accelerates the company's roadmap.
"We're seeing real momentum with AI Teammates and AI Studio," Rogers said.
What's Next for AsanaAsana is guiding for second-quarter revenue to be in a range of $213 million to $215 million, up 8.2% to 9.2% year-over-year. Analysts currently expect second-quarter revenue of $211.9 million.
For the second quarter, Asana is guiding for earnings of eight cents to nine cents per share. The Street estimate is currently nine cents per share.
Asana raised its full-year guidance for revenue to $855 million to $863.5 million, up from a prior range of $850 million to $858 million. The analyst estimate is currently $854.3 million.
The full-year revenue includes around 50 basis points of growth from the StackAI acquisition.
For the full year, Asana expects earnings of 37 cents per share, raised slightly from the previous range of 36 cents to 37 cents per share. Analysts currently expect full-year earnings per share of 37 cents.
Asana Stock Price ActionAsana stock is up 3.3% to $6.88 in after-hours trading on Thursday, versus a 52-week trading range of $5.38 to $19.
Photo: FellowNeko from Shutterstock
Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs
Avis Short Squeeze Shocked the Market: Are These 3 Stocks Next?Asana NYSE: ASAN reported fiscal first-quarter revenue that exceeded its guidance range and said customer retention, expansion activity and adoption of its artificial intelligence products improved during the period.
Chief Executive Officer Dan Rogers said the company generated revenue of $205.1 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2027, up 9.5% from a year earlier. He said non-GAAP operating margin expanded to 11.5%, an improvement of 720 basis points year over year, reflecting “continued progress in driving both growth and operating efficiency across the business.”
Get Asana alerts:
How Did Peter Thiel-Backed Crypto Exchange Bullish's IPO Go?Rogers said the company saw positive trends in customer retention and expansion, with overall in-quarter net retention improving for the fourth consecutive quarter to 97%. He said the improvement was broad-based across gross retention and expansion activity, supported by healthier seat adoption, improved customer engagement and early traction from Asana’s AI products.
AI Products Drive Expansion Activity Rogers said Asana’s strategy is to become “the operating system for human agent teams,” positioning the company around workflows where employees and AI agents collaborate on business-critical processes. He said the company believes many organizations have experienced personal productivity gains from AI chatbots but have not yet translated those gains into broader team or enterprise productivity.
E-Commerce Wars: Asana and Monday.com Battle for the Top SpotThe company highlighted growing adoption of AI Studio, which Rogers said became generally available roughly a year ago. AI Studio is used to automate repeatable work such as intake, classification, routing, quality checks and reporting. Rogers said early data shows customers adopting AI Studio have higher retention and stronger net revenue retention than the broader customer base, with the primary driver being seat expansion rather than lower churn alone.
During the quarter, Rogers said the number of customers spending more than $100,000 annually on AI Studio nearly doubled. In the question-and-answer session, Chief Financial Officer Aziz Megji clarified that those customers were spending more than $100,000 on the AI Studio SKU itself, excluding their core Asana seat spend.
Rogers also discussed AI Teammates, shared AI agents assigned to projects that work alongside employees within Asana’s Work Graph. He said paid conversion from the beta cohort has been strong and that tasks involving AI Teammates are completed nearly nine times faster. Asana said AI product bookings represented 17% of net new annual recurring revenue in the first quarter, ahead of its full-year target of 15%.
StackAI Acquisition Expands AI Workflow Ambitions Asana announced the acquisition of StackAI, a privately held AI software company that offers a no-code AI workflow platform for designing, testing, deploying and governing custom AI agents and intelligent automations. Rogers said StackAI extends Asana’s AI Studio capabilities by enabling workflows across enterprise systems such as CRMs, ERPs, databases, support systems, contracts and custom infrastructure.
Rogers said StackAI accelerates Asana’s roadmap by more than a year. In response to a question from Robert Oliver of Baird, Rogers said customers had been asking to extend AI Studio workflows into third-party systems, and StackAI already had demonstrated traction in complex operating environments, including regulated industries.
Megji said the transaction includes approximately $75 million in upfront cash consideration, along with an equity-based earn-out opportunity. He said the acquisition adds about 50 employees across engineering and AI-focused go-to-market functions. After adjusting for the deal, Megji said Asana would have more than $350 million in cash equivalents and marketable securities remaining on its balance sheet, including an assumption of $3 million of cash on StackAI’s balance sheet.
Customer Metrics and Vertical Trends Improve Megji said Asana ended the quarter with 26,103 “core customers,” defined as customers spending $5,000 or more on an annualized basis. Revenue from core customers grew 10% year over year and represented 76% of total revenue. The company had 817 customers spending $100,000 or more on an annualized basis, up 12% year over year.
Overall dollar-based net retention was 96%, while core customer net retention was 97%. Among customers spending $100,000 or more, net retention was 96%. Megji noted that these figures are trailing four-quarter averages and therefore lag more recent trends.
Rogers said the technology sector returned to positive year-over-year growth for the first time in eight quarters, aided by adoption across multiple products. He cited CoreWeave and Epson as customers that expanded with additional seats and AI products during the quarter. Megji said the improvement in tech was primarily driven by expansion, including add-on AI Studio and AI Teammates adoption, as well as seat expansion and improving retention.
Growth in non-technology sectors continued to outpace overall company growth, according to Rogers. He said international revenue rose 12% year over year, led by EMEA and APAC, and noted new customers including a British athletic apparel brand and IKEA Australia.
Profitability, Cash Flow and Buybacks Megji said Asana’s non-GAAP gross margin was 88%. Research and development expenses were $47.5 million, or 23% of revenue, while sales and marketing expenses were $83.5 million, or 41% of revenue. General and administrative expenses were $26.7 million, or 13% of revenue.
Non-GAAP net income was $24.4 million, or $0.10 per diluted share. Megji said profitability improvements were driven by operating leverage, disciplined spending, infrastructure and cloud cost optimization, and headcount discipline as the company uses AI across internal workflows.
Asana ended the quarter with $424.6 million in cash equivalents and marketable securities. Remaining performance obligations were $518.1 million, up 23% year over year, while current remaining performance obligations grew 18% year over year. Adjusted free cash flow was $34.4 million, or 17% of revenue.
The company repurchased $45 million of Class A common stock during the quarter, buying 7.4 million shares at an average price of $6.11 per share. Megji said Asana had roughly $155 million remaining under its current repurchase authorization as of April 30.
Guidance Includes StackAI Contribution For the second quarter of fiscal 2027, Asana expects revenue of $213 million to $215 million, representing growth of 8.2% to 9.2% year over year. The outlook includes an expected StackAI contribution of about 50 basis points to growth. The company expects non-GAAP operating income of $18 million to $20 million and non-GAAP net income of $0.08 to $0.09 per share.
For the full fiscal year, Asana expects revenue of $855.5 million to $863.5 million, also representing growth of 8.2% to 9.2%. The full-year outlook includes the first-quarter outperformance and an expected StackAI contribution of approximately 50 basis points to growth. Asana expects a full-year non-GAAP operating margin of at least 9.75% and non-GAAP net income of $0.37 per share.
Megji said the company’s outlook continues to assume roughly a two-point drag on annual recurring revenue growth from its product-led growth motion, only modest improvement in net retention over the year, and AI product bookings contributing about 15% of net new ARR in fiscal 2027. He said Asana plans to provide a more comprehensive update on AI product contribution during its second-quarter call.
About Asana NYSE: ASANAsana, Inc NYSE: ASAN is a leading provider of work management and collaboration software designed to help teams organize, track and manage their work. Founded in 2008 by Dustin Moskovitz and Justin Rosenstein, Asana's platform enables users to create projects, assign tasks, set deadlines and visualize progress across diverse workflows. The company's cloud-based solution includes customizable project templates, timeline views, boards and automated rules that streamline routine processes and reduce manual effort.
Built for both small teams and large enterprises, Asana supports integrations with a wide array of third-party applications, including communication tools, file-sharing services and DevOps platforms.
This instant news alert was generated by narrative science technology and financial data from MarketBeat in order to provide readers with the fastest reporting and unbiased coverage. Please send any questions or comments about this story to [email protected].
Should You Invest $1,000 in Asana Right Now?Before you consider Asana, you'll want to hear this.
MarketBeat keeps track of Wall Street's top-rated and best performing research analysts and the stocks they recommend to their clients on a daily basis. MarketBeat has identified the five stocks that top analysts are quietly whispering to their clients to buy now before the broader market catches on... and Asana wasn't on the list.
While Asana currently has a Hold rating among analysts, top-rated analysts believe these five stocks are better buys.
View The Five Stocks Here
MarketBeat's analysts have just released their top five short plays for June 2026. Learn which stocks have the most short interest and how to trade them. Click the link to see which companies made the list.
Asana, Inc. (ASAN - Free Report) came out with quarterly earnings of $0.1 per share, beating the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $0.08 per share. This compares to earnings of $0.05 per share a year ago. These figures are adjusted for non-recurring items.
This quarterly report represents an earnings surprise of +29.03%. A quarter ago, it was expected that this company would post earnings of $0.07 per share when it actually produced earnings of $0.08, delivering a surprise of +14.29%.
Over the last four quarters, the company has surpassed consensus EPS estimates four times.
Asana, which belongs to the Zacks Internet - Software industry, posted revenues of $205.1 million for the quarter ended April 2026, surpassing the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 0.79%. This compares to year-ago revenues of $187.27 million. The company has topped consensus revenue estimates four times over the last four quarters.
The sustainability of the stock's immediate price movement based on the recently-released numbers and future earnings expectations will mostly depend on management's commentary on the earnings call.
Asana shares have lost about 53.3% since the beginning of the year versus the S&P 500's gain of 9.9%.
What's Next for Asana?While Asana has underperformed the market so far this year, the question that comes to investors' minds is: what's next for the stock?
There are no easy answers to this key question, but one reliable measure that can help investors address this is the company's earnings outlook. Not only does this include current consensus earnings expectations for the coming quarter(s), but also how these expectations have changed lately.
Empirical research shows a strong correlation between near-term stock movements and trends in earnings estimate revisions. Investors can track such revisions by themselves or rely on a tried-and-tested rating tool like the Zacks Rank, which has an impressive track record of harnessing the power of earnings estimate revisions.
Ahead of this earnings release, the estimate revisions trend for Asana was mixed. While the magnitude and direction of estimate revisions could change following the company's just-released earnings report, the current status translates into a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold) for the stock. So, the shares are expected to perform in line with the market in the near future. You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
It will be interesting to see how estimates for the coming quarters and the current fiscal year change in the days ahead. The current consensus EPS estimate is $0.09 on $211.9 million in revenues for the coming quarter and $0.37 on $854.01 million in revenues for the current fiscal year.
Investors should be mindful of the fact that the outlook for the industry can have a material impact on the performance of the stock as well. In terms of the Zacks Industry Rank, Internet - Software is currently in the top 30% of the 250 plus Zacks industries. Our research shows that the top 50% of the Zacks-ranked industries outperform the bottom 50% by a factor of more than 2 to 1.
Oddity Tech (ODD - Free Report) , another stock in the same industry, has yet to report results for the quarter ended March 2026. The results are expected to be released on June 2.
This online retailer of cosmetics and beauty products is expected to post quarterly loss of $0.04 per share in its upcoming report, which represents a year-over-year change of -105.8%. The consensus EPS estimate for the quarter has remained unchanged over the last 30 days.
Oddity Tech's revenues are expected to be $187.65 million, down 30% from the year-ago quarter.
NYSE issues a pre-market daily advisory direct from the trading floor. NEW YORK, May 29, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) provides a daily pre-market update directly from the NYSE Trading Floor.
Asana is upgraded to 'Neutral' after a Q1 beat-and-raise and the StackAI acquisition, despite a 50% YTD share price decline. Agentic AI capabilities from StackAI enhance ASAN's workflow automation, positioning it as an end-to-end solution in modern IT. ASAN faces material risks: sub-100% net retention rates and vulnerability from seat-based pricing amid AI-driven workforce reductions.
SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Asana, Inc. (NYSE: ASAN)(LTSE: ASAN), the operating system for human-agent teams, today announced that Asana’s executives will present at the following investor events:
Bank of America 2026 Global Technology Conference on June 2, 2026 at 10:40 a.m. PT / 1:40 p.m. ET Baird 2026 Global Consumer, Technology & Services Conference on June 4, 2026 at 6:40 a.m. PT / 9:40 a.m. ET Asana Investor Webinar: OS for Human-Agent Teams - Strategy and Innovation Showcase on June 8, 2026 at 7:00 a.m. PT / 10:00 a.m. ET A live webcast will be available on Asana’s website at https://investors.asana.com.
About Asana
Asana is the operating system for human-agent teams. Built on the Enterprise Work Graph and 18 years of multiplayer architecture, Asana is where an organization’s humans and agents run critical workflows together - from a shared plan, with shared memory, all under enterprise-grade governance. Learn more at asana.com.
Agentic Work Management solves the AI productivity gap; Organizations can run critical work with humans and agents on the same plan, with the same context, under the same governance
Asana announces next generation AI Teammates purpose-built for industries and Asana Dash, an AI Chief of Staff for every user that knows your individual goals, priorities and what needs your attention
New apps coming soon: Asana Service Management for IT, Command by Asana for Builders, and Asana Client Management for Professional Services
LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Asana, Inc. (NYSE: ASAN)(LTSE: ASAN) today unveiled the operating system for human-agent teams: a new product suite designed to help organizations run critical work with humans and AI agents working from the same plan, with the same context, under the same governance — unlocking enterprise productivity at scale. Announced at the Work Innovation Summit in London, the launch marks Asana’s most significant product evolution to date.
The launch arrives at a pivotal moment for enterprises. Today, 75% of knowledge workers use AI on the job*, yet only 5% of companies report meaningful productivity gains**. This is what Asana calls the AI productivity gap, and it comes down to four reasons:
Hard to get started: It's hard for teams to discover the right agents and visualize their current processes and workflows. Agents aren't team players: There is no framework for individuals to interact with agents in multiplayer mode alongside the rest of their team. Agents lack context: Most agents aren't onboarded with the context of how their teams operate, prior decisions, or what their priorities are. Hard to govern: CIOs and IT leaders are concerned about agents operating with unchecked data access and no cost oversight. Organizations need an operating layer on top, a place where humans and agents run critical workflows together.
This is what Asana can deliver today.
What’s new
Agentic Work Management is Asana's easy button for AI productivity across every team. Built to close the AI gap, it delivers in several key ways: supercharging teams with ready-to-go agents, eliminating the busywork that slows every team down, and making sure every individual always knows their next best action.
Agentic Work Management enabled by a new generation of teammates
Agentic Work Management introduces a new way to use Asana, with agents enabled for every layer of the business:
For personal use, an AI Chief of Staff - called Asana Dash - that understands each user’s goals, priorities, and the work that needs attention across teams and tools. It captures follow-ups from meetings, Slack threads, and email, turns them into structured work in the Work Graph, and connects users to the right AI Teammates for specific tasks and projects to move work forward. For teams, AI Teammates are now more capable, more connected, and easier to adopt, with a new chat-based front door, in-product recommendations, a Skills library for repeatable work, and integrations across Gmail, Outlook, Slack, HubSpot, Figma, Canva, and more. Because they operate in a shared system with memory of past decisions and working patterns, each workflow starts with more context and gets sharper over time. For specific industries where teams rely on deeply specialized workflows, Asana is expanding its portfolio of AI Teammates with pre-built, industry-specific agents for high-value workflows in manufacturing, retail, and other industries. Each arrives pre-onboarded to the work it supports, helping teams get value faster. With StackAI, Agentic Work Management extends across enterprise systems
With StackAI, acquired in May 2026, customers can extend Agentic Work Management beyond the Work Graph into the systems where work actually happens. AI Studio, AI Teammates, and StackAI together let customers orchestrate complex, multi-step workflows across CRMs, ERPs, collaboration tools, support systems, contracts, databases, and custom infrastructure — not just within Asana. Teams can plan work, coordinate humans and agents through one shared system, and execute across the enterprise with the context, governance, and handoffs production use demands.
New applications coming soon: the OS packaged for the teams that need it most
Asana is packaging its operating system for the teams whose work is most dependent on coordinated execution.
Asana Service Management unifies ticketing and project execution for IT, HR, facilities, and other service teams to resolve key issues without human touch. A self-learning knowledge base improves deflection over time. When a request needs another team involved, Asana can move from ticket to project without losing context, something legacy ITSM tools structurally cannot do. Command by Asana is a planning and product development system for humans and agents to work in sync. Specs write themselves from context across past tickets, PRs, meetings, and notes. Releases hold because engineering managers can model their backlog against release dates and run what-if scenarios across capacity and velocity without the spreadsheets. Leaders can ask a question or check the live dashboard to see what's off track, why, and which dependencies are hidden. Asana Client Management runs the full agency lifecycle in one system. Deliver every client a branded portal where all communication lives in one place, keeping them informed and aligned from intake through delivery. AI agents handle the work that slows teams down: capacity planning, SOW creation, asset production, status drafts. And, with a live view of project and client health, resourcing decisions happen before problems surface, not after. "For 18 years, Asana has solved one of the hardest problems in business: helping teams coordinate at scale across goals, decisions, and handoffs. The foundation we built - the Enterprise Work Graph, shared memory, multiplayer coordination, and governance - is precisely what the agentic era requires. Asana's OS is how AI moves from helping individuals work faster to supercharging entire organizations," said Dan Rogers, CEO of Asana.
“Many vendors are repositioning around AI agents, but layering agents onto coordination-centric systems does not address the core challenge of enterprise execution. As organizations move toward more dynamic, cross-system workflows, the need is shifting from coordination to Adaptive Work Orchestration, where humans and AI operate against shared context, with embedded governance and continuous visibility. Asana’s Agentic Work Management approach reflects this shift, combining a structured work graph with orchestration capabilities to support execution across people, systems, and intelligent agents at scale,” says Riana Barnard, Industry Analyst at Frost & Sullivan.
Customers adopting Agentic Work Management
FedEx has deployed AI Studio and AI Teammates across marketing and sales, driving a 9x improvement in speed to market and generating hundreds of thousands of dollars in annual operational savings. In marketing, FedEx consolidated intake from more than 24 forms into a single intelligent workflow using AI Studio, with AI Teammates drafting go-to-market plans and creative briefs, reducing planning cycles from weeks to days and reclaiming over 1,200 hours annually. In sales enablement, intake review time dropped from 90 minutes to 30 minutes, with automated portfolios handling cross-region launch sequencing in real time to optimize seller capacity. At the leadership level, AI Teammates generated summaries and status updates providing 100% visibility into global initiatives, and reclaiming over 300 hours previously spent on manual alignment.
COS, the global fashion brand within the H&M Group, used AI Studio and AI Teammates to transform campaign production across marketing, ecommerce, and regional teams worldwide - cutting campaign setup time by 90%, doubling asset output to more than 1,000 assets per campaign, and eliminating nearly 3,000 hours of annual manual work. As COS put it: "Asana hasn't merely improved our processes - it has redefined how we work."
Asana's Work Innovation Summit comes to London today
Leaders and practitioners from around the world are gathering in London today for Asana's Work Innovation Summit - a day of fresh ideas, hands-on learning, and meaningful connection about how to build the agentic enterprise. Attendees get hands-on time with the latest capabilities and direct access to the peers and experts shaping how humans and agents work together. For more information or to watch on-demand visit here.
Availability
Agentic Work Management, including AI Teammates and AI Studio, is available today. Asana Dash, Asana Service Management, Command by Asana, and Asana Client Management will be made available in phases over the coming months. For the latest information visit asana.com/ai.
About Asana
Asana is the operating system for human-agent teams. Built on the Enterprise Work Graph® and 18 years of multiplayer architecture, Asana is where an organization’s humans and agents run critical workflows together - from a shared plan, with shared memory, backed by enterprise-grade governance. Learn more at asana.com.
*Microsoft and LinkedIn, 2024 Work Trend Index Annual Report: AI at Work Is Here. Now Comes the Hard Part, May 8, 2024.
**Boston Consulting Group, The Widening AI Value Gap, September 30, 2025.
Asana, Inc. (NYSE: ASAN)(LTSE: ASAN) today unveiled the operating system for human-agent teams: a new product suite designed to help organizations run critical work with humans and AI agents working from the same plan, with the same context, under the same governance — unlocking enterprise productivity at scale. Announced at the Work Innovation Summit in London, the launch marks Asana’s most significant product evolution to date.
The launch arrives at a pivotal moment for enterprises. Today, 75% of knowledge workers use AI on the job*, yet only 5% of companies report meaningful productivity gains**. This is what Asana calls the AI productivity gap, and it comes down to four reasons:
Hard to get started: It's hard for teams to discover the right agents and visualize their current processes and workflows. Agents aren't team players: There is no framework for individuals to interact with agents in multiplayer mode alongside the rest of their team. Agents lack context: Most agents aren't onboarded with the context of how their teams operate, prior decisions, or what their priorities are. Hard to govern: CIOs and IT leaders are concerned about agents operating with unchecked data access and no cost oversight. Organizations need an operating layer on top, a place where humans and agents run critical workflows together.
This is what Asana can deliver today.
What’s new
Agentic Work Management is Asana's easy button for AI productivity across every team. Built to close the AI gap, it delivers in several key ways: supercharging teams with ready-to-go agents, eliminating the busywork that slows every team down, and making sure every individual always knows their next best action.
Agentic Work Management enabled by a new generation of teammates
Agentic Work Management introduces a new way to use Asana, with agents enabled for every layer of the business:
For personal use, an AI Chief of Staff - called Asana Dash - that understands each user’s goals, priorities, and the work that needs attention across teams and tools. It captures follow-ups from meetings, Slack threads, and email, turns them into structured work in the Work Graph, and connects users to the right AI Teammates for specific tasks and projects to move work forward. For teams, AI Teammates are now more capable, more connected, and easier to adopt, with a new chat-based front door, in-product recommendations, a Skills library for repeatable work, and integrations across Gmail, Outlook, Slack, HubSpot, Figma, Canva, and more. Because they operate in a shared system with memory of past decisions and working patterns, each workflow starts with more context and gets sharper over time. For specific industries where teams rely on deeply specialized workflows, Asana is expanding its portfolio of AI Teammates with pre-built, industry-specific agents for high-value workflows in manufacturing, retail, and other industries. Each arrives pre-onboarded to the work it supports, helping teams get value faster. With StackAI, Agentic Work Management extends across enterprise systems
With StackAI, acquired in May 2026, customers can extend Agentic Work Management beyond the Work Graph into the systems where work actually happens. AI Studio, AI Teammates, and StackAI together let customers orchestrate complex, multi-step workflows across CRMs, ERPs, collaboration tools, support systems, contracts, databases, and custom infrastructure — not just within Asana. Teams can plan work, coordinate humans and agents through one shared system, and execute across the enterprise with the context, governance, and handoffs production use demands.
New applications coming soon: the OS packaged for the teams that need it most
Asana is packaging its operating system for the teams whose work is most dependent on coordinated execution.
Asana Service Managementunifies ticketing and project execution for IT, HR, facilities, and other service teams to resolve key issues without human touch. A self-learning knowledge base improves deflection over time. When a request needs another team involved, Asana can move from ticket to project without losing context, something legacy ITSM tools structurally cannot do. Command by Asanais a planning and product development system for humans and agents to work in sync. Specs write themselves from context across past tickets, PRs, meetings, and notes. Releases hold because engineering managers can model their backlog against release dates and run what-if scenarios across capacity and velocity without the spreadsheets. Leaders can ask a question or check the live dashboard to see what's off track, why, and which dependencies are hidden. Asana Client Management runs the full agency lifecycle in one system. Deliver every client a branded portal where all communication lives in one place, keeping them informed and aligned from intake through delivery. AI agents handle the work that slows teams down: capacity planning, SOW creation, asset production, status drafts. And, with a live view of project and client health, resourcing decisions happen before problems surface, not after. "For 18 years, Asana has solved one of the hardest problems in business: helping teams coordinate at scale across goals, decisions, and handoffs. The foundation we built - the Enterprise Work Graph, shared memory, multiplayer coordination, and governance - is precisely what the agentic era requires. Asana's OS is how AI moves from helping individuals work faster to supercharging entire organizations," said Dan Rogers, CEO of Asana.
“Many vendors are repositioning around AI agents, but layering agents onto coordination-centric systems does not address the core challenge of enterprise execution. As organizations move toward more dynamic, cross-system workflows, the need is shifting from coordination to Adaptive Work Orchestration, where humans and AI operate against shared context, with embedded governance and continuous visibility. Asana’s Agentic Work Management approach reflects this shift, combining a structured work graph with orchestration capabilities to support execution across people, systems, and intelligent agents at scale,” says Riana Barnard, Industry Analyst at Frost & Sullivan.
Customers adopting Agentic Work Management
FedEx has deployed AI Studio and AI Teammates across marketing and sales, driving a 9x improvement in speed to market and generating hundreds of thousands of dollars in annual operational savings. In marketing, FedEx consolidated intake from more than 24 forms into a single intelligent workflow using AI Studio, with AI Teammates drafting go-to-market plans and creative briefs, reducing planning cycles from weeks to days and reclaiming over 1,200 hours annually. In sales enablement, intake review time dropped from 90 minutes to 30 minutes, with automated portfolios handling cross-region launch sequencing in real time to optimize seller capacity. At the leadership level, AI Teammates generated summaries and status updates providing 100% visibility into global initiatives, and reclaiming over 300 hours previously spent on manual alignment.
COS, the global fashion brand within the H&M Group, used AI Studio and AI Teammates to transform campaign production across marketing, ecommerce, and regional teams worldwide - cutting campaign setup time by 90%, doubling asset output to more than 1,000 assets per campaign, and eliminating nearly 3,000 hours of annual manual work. As COS put it: "Asana hasn't merely improved our processes - it has redefined how we work."
Asana's Work Innovation Summit comes to London today
Leaders and practitioners from around the world are gathering in London today for Asana's Work Innovation Summit - a day of fresh ideas, hands-on learning, and meaningful connection about how to build the agentic enterprise. Attendees get hands-on time with the latest capabilities and direct access to the peers and experts shaping how humans and agents work together. For more information or to watch on-demand visit here.
Availability
Agentic Work Management, including AI Teammates and AI Studio, is available today. Asana Dash, Asana Service Management, Command by Asana, and Asana Client Management will be made available in phases over the coming months. For the latest information visit asana.com/ai.
About Asana
Asana is the operating system for human-agent teams. Built on the Enterprise Work Graph® and 18 years of multiplayer architecture, Asana is where an organization’s humans and agents run critical workflows together - from a shared plan, with shared memory, backed by enterprise-grade governance. Learn more at asana.com.
*Microsoft and LinkedIn, 2024 Work Trend Index Annual Report: AI at Work Is Here. Now Comes the Hard Part, May 8, 2024.
**Boston Consulting Group, The Widening AI Value Gap, September 30, 2025.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260604472500/en/
This post may contain links from our sponsors and affiliates, and Flywheel Publishing may receive compensation for actions taken through them.
Public SaaS valuations have compressed over two years while private equity dry powder and strategic acquirer balance sheets remain robust, and that gap matters. Mid-cap software names with mature recurring revenue, expanding free cash flow, and decelerating top-line growth appeal to both private equity (PE) sponsors and stack-consolidating strategics. Three names stand out as 2026 takeover candidates: Asana (NYSE:ASAN | ASAN Price Prediction), Freshworks (NASDAQ:FRSH), and PagerDuty (NYSE:PD).
Our ranking criteria:
Depressed market cap relative to annual recurring revenue (ARR) Improving free cash flow (FCF) (PE-attractive) Slowing organic growth (needs strategic owner) Founder or CEO transitions Active buybacks signaling boardroom belief in undervaluation Credible strategic acquirers with obvious stack fit 3. Freshworks Freshworks is the strongest standalone story of the trio, which paradoxically makes it the least probable target. Q1 2026 revenue grew 16% year-over-year to $228.6 million, while its non-GAAP operating margin came in at 17.9%, and net dollar retention rate held steady at 106%. The Employee Experience (EX) segment surged 27% to over $540 million in ARR, bolstered by strong generative AI adoption, with Freddy AI Copilot customer growth exceeding 80% year-over-year. Management also continued aggressively returning capital to shareholders, repurchasing $45.4 million of Class A stock during the quarter under its ongoing buyback program.
Shares trade at $9.55, down 38.7% over the past year, against a market cap of $2.6 billion and EV/Revenue of 2.5x. The forward P/E is near 17x. Strategic fit is clean for Salesforce, Oracle, IBM, or Adobe looking to slot a mid-market CRM/ITSM suite below their enterprise SKUs. PE rollup of mid-market SaaS is plausible. Here’s the catch: Indian operational base adds cross-border considerations, and the largest cap of the trio means the biggest check. Management appears intent on remaining independent.
2. Asana Asana checks the founder-transition box. Co-founder Dustin Moskovitz stepped aside; Dan Rogers is now CEO. Q1 FY27 revenue grew 9.5% year over year to $205.09 million, non-GAAP EPS hit $0.10, and free cash flow inflected to $34.35 million. Shares jumped 14% on the earnings report. Asana repurchased $44.99 million of stock in Q1, with more than $150 million still authorized.
Logical strategic acquirers include Salesforce, ServiceNow, Microsoft, and Atlassian, each gaining a work-management layer plus AI Studio, AI Teammates, and StackAI assets that Rogers calls “the operating system for human-agent teams.” The catch is governance: Moskovitz retains super-voting shares and has been a heavy personal buyer. Any deal requires his blessing, making hostile bids or pure PE take-privates structurally difficult without his consent. Net retention at 96% and a year-to-date price drop of 41.9% make the valuation tempting at 2.4x EV/Revenue.
1. PagerDuty PagerDuty is the textbook setup. Market cap of $717 million is the smallest of the trio and easiest check for a strategic takeover. Revenue grew just 1.0% year over year to $120.97 million in Q1 FY27, ARR is flat at $496 million, and net retention slipped to 97% from 104%. Growth deceleration from 6.5% to 1.0% over four quarters forces a board to consider strategic alternatives.
The cash-flow profile strengthens the thesis. Q1 FCF reached $41.19 million, non-GAAP operating margin expanded to 24.6%, and PagerDuty posted its fourth consecutive quarter of GAAP profitability. A fresh $100 million buyback was authorized, with $65.46 million deployed in Q1. EV/Revenue of 1.6x against EBITDA of $39.4 million is the multiple that leveraged buyout (LBO) models target.
CEO transition closes the loop: Jennifer Tejada stepped down, and John DiLullo took over. New leadership typically gets 12 to 18 months to reaccelerate growth or run a process. Strategic fit is obvious: ServiceNow (incident management adjacency), Atlassian (Jira/Opsgenie consolidation), Datadog (observability stack), Cisco (post-Splunk extension), or IBM. Enterprise customers including BCG, CoreWeave, GM, Palo Alto Networks, Vodafone, Nvidia, and Anthropic deepen the strategic moat. PE take-private math also works given the FCF base. Shares are down 37.7% over the past year despite a 29.4% one-week rally, suggesting the market is pricing in optionality.
The Consolidation Backdrop Private market SaaS multiples have held up far better than public ones, fueling the arbitrage behind any 2026 deal wave. PagerDuty fits every box: small enough to swallow, profitable enough to lever, slow enough to need a parent, and led by a brand-new CEO whose first job is defining a path forward. Asana sits one step behind because Moskovitz controls timing. Freshworks remains the standalone. All three are setups. No deals have been announced; each remains a speculative scenario, with PagerDuty representing the cleanest setup.
