Celestica reported second-quarter results at 20:38 UTC on 27 July, beating the top end of its own guidance and raising its full-year outlook by $1.5 billion. As a contract manufacturer sitting directly under the hyperscalers, it is one of the few reads on AI infrastructure demand that does not come from the hyperscalers themselves.
The numbers
Revenue of $4.70 billion, up 62% from $2.89 billion, with adjusted earnings per share of $2.54 against $1.39 — both above the high end of guidance. The connectivity and cloud solutions segment reached $3.81 billion, up 84%, at an 8.7% margin. Hardware platform solutions came in around $1.9 billion, up 58%. Full-year 2026 guidance was raised to revenue of $20.5 billion from $19.0 billion, adjusted EPS to $11.30 from $10.15, adjusted operating margin to 8.4%, and free cash flow to $600 million.
The forward claim
Celestica guided 2027 revenue growth to accelerate beyond the roughly 65% expected in 2026. That is an unusually strong statement to make eighteen months out, and it is the single most consequential line in the release.
What is not disclosed
None of this is "AI revenue." It is total and segment revenue for a contract manufacturer whose growth comes from a small number of hyperscaler programmes — and the release discloses no customer concentration percentage and no bookings figure. That matters directly: the 2027 acceleration claim rests on programme wins that are not quantified anywhere in the document. The margin is also worth keeping in view. At 8.4%, this is hardware assembly economics; a 62% revenue increase at those margins is a very different business from a 62% increase in software.
Why the timing matters
This landed two days before Microsoft reports and in the middle of a week when investors have been openly sceptical about AI capex. A supply-chain company with no incentive to talk its customers' spending up just raised guidance and pointed higher for next year — from a position further down the chain than anyone issuing capex guidance.