VAST Data ECONOMIC

Request ID: 7c90b501-6c6b-408d-a801-853d4c26f407 Research cut-off: 29 September 2026

Scope and target identity

The reviewed record shows both a substantial Israeli legal/R&D nexus and substantial U.S./global operations. Israel OpenBudget’s public company page identifies VAST DATA LTD, company no. 515350155, as an active Israeli private company incorporated on 2 December 2015 at 97 Rokach Blvd., Tel Aviv; the page states that its information comes from public/government databases and points to the Companies Registrar for ownership extracts.¹ A USPTO assignment record likewise identifies VAST DATA LTD. at that Tel Aviv address as the receiving party for a patent application.² VAST’s own current communications describe the business as remote-first and issue major corporate announcements from New York, while independent reporting describes VAST as Israeli-founded and U.S.-headquartered.^{3, 4}

Founder/CEO Renen Hallak is recorded by UK Companies House as an Israeli national resident in the United States.⁵ Public reporting identifies co-founder Shachar Fienblit as leading development and operations in Israel.³ The Israel nexus is structural to VAST’s formation and core engineering footprint: an Israeli company existed before the public 2016 founding narrative, engineering was historically centered in Tel Aviv, a Haifa development centre was added, and by 2026 roughly one third of VAST’s approximately 1,100 employees were in Israel.^{1, 6, 7, 3} This audit therefore treats the VAST group, its Israeli operating/IP entity and attributable controlling principals where ownership is verifiable as the target; it does not infer a current controlling shareholder from incomplete private-company cap-table data.

Israeli-Nexus Floor checks

Founding and legal domicile

The public company record predates VAST’s usual public 2016 founding date: VAST DATA LTD was incorporated in Israel on 2 December 2015, while VAST’s corporate and funding materials describe the venture as founded in 2016.^{1, 8} The distinction is material: the public brand/start-up story begins in 2016, but an Israeli corporate entity existed in late 2015 and remains active in the current public company record.¹

Headquarters and principal management

The reviewed evidence does not establish Israel as VAST’s current principal place of management. VAST said in 2022 that its business operations had largely remained in the United States even while its engineering team had remained in Tel Aviv; current releases describe a remote-first company and are issued from New York.^{6, 4} Hallak is recorded as U.S.-resident.⁵ no public evidence identified that the group’s current principal management or global headquarters is legally in Israel.^{5, 6, 4}

Israeli R&D and workforce

Israel is a major and structurally embedded engineering base. VAST’s 2022 engineering article said its engineering team had remained in Tel Aviv before expansion to Raleigh and that the company would continue growing engineering internationally.⁶ CTech reported a Haifa development centre in addition to Tel Aviv.⁷ In 2026 CTech reported about 1,100 employees globally, roughly one third in Israel, and identified Fienblit as the executive leading development and operations in Israel.³ The scale, continuity and leadership of this footprint show that Israeli R&D is part of VAST’s core product-development structure rather than a nominal sales-office presence.^{6, 7, 3}

Structural significance of the Israeli nexus

The founding and R&D evidence is cumulative. VAST DATA LTD was incorporated in Israel in December 2015; VAST’s engineering organization was historically centered in Tel Aviv; the company added a second Israeli development centre in Haifa; and approximately one third of the global workforce was reported in Israel in 2026 under a co-founder responsible for development and operations there.^{1, 6, 7, 3} A 2025 USPTO assignment also identifies the Tel Aviv VAST DATA LTD entity as the receiving party for a patent application, showing continuing participation of the Israeli entity in the group’s technology/IP structure.² Together these facts establish a substantial, continuing and structurally significant Israeli core-R&D/economic footprint even though the reviewed evidence does not establish Israel as the current global headquarters or principal place of management.^{2, 5, 6, 3}

Tax status, PTE and Innovation Authority

No public evidence identified establishing an Israeli tax-residency determination, Preferred Technology Enterprise status, a disclosed PTE tax rate, or an Israel Innovation Authority grant/award for VAST. The Israeli incorporation, offices and workforce are documented, but those facts do not by themselves establish a specific tax incentive or grant.^{1, 6, 3}

Beneficial ownership and controlling principals

VAST announced a $100m Series C in 2020, an $83m Series D in 2021, a $118m Series E in 2023, and an approximately $1bn Series F primary/secondary transaction in 2026; the named investors include Next47, 83North, Norwest, Dell Technologies Capital, Goldman Sachs, Greenfield, Mellanox/NVIDIA, Tiger Global, Fidelity, NEA, BOND, Drive Capital and Access Industries across those rounds.^{8, 9, 10, 4} Those public financing announcements do not disclose a complete current cap table or voting-control schedule.^{4, 8}

The 2026 Series F included both primary and secondary capital, so part of the transaction provided liquidity to existing holders rather than all proceeds entering VAST; independent Globes reporting also described the approximately $1 billion raise at a $30 billion valuation.^{4, 11} No reliable public evidence identified that establishes a current individual or entity with >=10% ownership/voting control, or that proves the company is currently beneficially controlled by Israeli capital. Hallak’s Israeli nationality and founder/CEO status are documented, but nationality alone is not a percentage-control finding.^{5, 4}

Supply Chain & Sourcing Relationships

VAST is a software/data-infrastructure company whose platform combines storage, database and compute/data services for AI workloads.¹² Accordingly, the agricultural/product-sourcing categories in the handoff were searched but yielded no applicable evidence.

• Direct supplier relationships: no public evidence identified of procurement from Mehadrin, Hadiklaim, Galilee Export, Agrexco successors, or other Israeli agricultural exporters.^{13, 12}
• Importer-of-record structure: no public evidence identified of a dedicated importer-of-record entity for physical goods from Israel or occupied territory. The identified related entities instead concern software/R&D, UK operations and a U.S. public-sector subsidiary.^{14, 15}
• Seasonal sourcing: no public evidence identified of recurring Israeli produce procurement.¹²
• Third-party/indirect sourcing: no public evidence identified of Israeli-origin consumer goods reaching VAST through distributors, private label or white-label retail arrangements.¹²

Product Origin, Labeling & Regulatory Compliance

VAST’s disclosed products are enterprise data/AI software infrastructure rather than food or consumer retail goods.¹² no public evidence identified of settlement-origin merchandise, country-of-origin produce disputes, DEFRA/customs labelling enforcement, or a corporate policy for labelling goods from occupied territories.^{16, 13, 12}

The September 2025 OHCHR settlement-business database update covers specified settlement-related business activities and lists 158 enterprises.¹⁶ The reviewed database material did not identify VAST Data as a listed enterprise, and the broader 2025 A/HRC/59/23 material reviewed did not identify a VAST-specific settlement activity.^{16, 13} Non-listing is a bounded research result, not proof that every possible indirect relationship is absent.

Investment, Capital & Financial Exposure

Foreign direct investment and Israeli operating investment

VAST maintains an active Israeli private company and material development operations in Tel Aviv and Haifa.^{1, 6, 7} A USPTO assignment record identifies the Tel Aviv Israeli entity as a patent-application assignee/receiving party, confirming that the Israeli legal entity participates in the group’s technology/IP structure.² Current reporting places roughly one third of VAST’s approximately 1,100 employees in Israel.³ In combination, those facts make the Israeli presence a substantial operating and core-R&D investment within the group rather than a market-access office.^{1, 2, 6, 7, 3}

R&D and innovation centres

VAST’s own 2022 account says its engineering team had historically remained in Tel Aviv, while CTech reported the additional Haifa development centre.^{6, 7} In 2026 CTech said Fienblit leads development and operations in Israel.³ no public evidence identified of a separately branded accelerator programme or Innovation Authority-funded lab.^{6, 3}

Funding, shareholders and ownership flows

VAST’s financing history shows repeated large external equity rounds: $100m Series C in 2020, $83m Series D in 2021, $118m Series E in 2023 and about $1bn of primary/secondary capital in Series F in 2026.^{8, 9, 10, 4} The rounds include both Israel-linked early investors and large international investors, but the public materials do not disclose a complete post-Series-F ownership table or voting-control schedule.^{1, 4, 8}

Because VAST is an operating technology company rather than a bank, insurer or asset manager, the handoff’s sovereign-bond/financial-intermediation tests were also checked. No public evidence identified of VAST underwriting Israeli sovereign debt or war bonds, selling Israel Bonds, holding a disclosed portfolio of Israeli sovereign bonds, providing trade finance to OHCHR-listed companies, or operating an asset-management portfolio invested in settlement-active companies.^{16, 13}

Acquired Israeli subsidiaries

VAST announced the acquisition of Red Stapler on 9 September 2025 to strengthen its hyperscale-cloud strategy.¹⁷ The VAST release describes Red Stapler’s cloud-control/service-delivery technology and team; it does not identify Red Stapler as an Israeli operating company.¹⁷ no public evidence identified of VAST acquiring or holding a controlling stake in a separate Israeli manufacturer, consumer brand, pharma/biotech company, cyber company or infrastructure operator beyond its own Israeli VAST DATA LTD entity.^{1, 17}

Controlling principals’ separate investments

Hallak is documented as an Israeli founder/CEO, while Companies House records him as U.S.-resident.^{5, 4} no public evidence identified in the focused searches of a material personal/family-office investment by Hallak, Fienblit or another verified >=10% controller into a separate Israeli operating company that can be attributed under the handoff’s controlling-principal rule. The absence of a verified current >=10% cap-table holder limits this part of the audit.^{4, 8}

Operational Presence & Market Activity

Physical footprint and employment

The Israeli operating footprint is substantial and central to product development: Tel Aviv engineering, a Haifa development centre, and roughly one third of about 1,100 employees in Israel by 2026 reporting.^{6, 7, 3} The public company record lists VAST DATA LTD as an active Israeli private company at 97 Rokach Blvd., Tel Aviv.¹ Fienblit’s reported responsibility for development and operations in Israel further indicates that the footprint has dedicated senior operational leadership.³

Israeli sovereign AI infrastructure via SDS

On 30 September 2025 VAST and Shonfeld Data Services announced a long-term strategic partnership to power what they described as one of Israel’s largest/most advanced sovereign AI clouds.¹⁸ VAST said the build uses dozens of petabytes of VAST-powered data infrastructure and thousands of NVIDIA Blackwell GPUs/networking, and is intended to support national AI initiatives plus large customers in cybersecurity, finance, healthcare and government sectors.¹⁸ CTech independently reported the partnership and SDS’s dominant colocation-market position.¹⁹

Globes reported that the SDS/VAST server farm at Bet Yehoshua would initially contain about 2,000 Blackwell B200 GPUs and estimated the overall investment at about NIS 1bn.²⁰ That figure is an estimate for the server-farm project, not a disclosed VAST contract value. The sources do not name an Israeli ministry, IDF/IMOD, police, prison service, intelligence service or settlement authority as a customer or beneficiary.^{18, 19, 20}

Market positioning

VAST publicly frames the SDS relationship as national-scale AI infrastructure and a long-term partnership supporting Israel’s AI ecosystem.¹⁸ Separately, VAST has described its international expansion as a global partner-led business and retains substantial operations outside Israel.²¹ These facts support a significant Israeli market/R&D role while also showing that the company operates globally.^{18, 21}

Corporate Structure & Foundational Ties

Founding and incorporation history

The strongest legal evidence is the active Israeli VAST DATA LTD entity incorporated on 2 December 2015.¹ Corporate materials describe VAST as founded in 2016, and the subsequent financing history developed around the same VAST business.⁸ Public reporting consistently describes the company as Israeli-founded while current operating communications are remote-first/U.S.-centred.^{3, 4}

Group entities and subsidiaries

VAST DATA UK LIMITED is an active UK private company incorporated in 2019.¹⁵ VAST also publicly identifies VAST Data Federal as a U.S. public-sector subsidiary, launched in 2021.¹⁴ The reviewed public sources do not provide a complete legal-entity chart establishing the precise parent/subsidiary relationship among every VAST entity, so no unsupported ultimate-parent hierarchy is asserted.^{14, 15}

State and institutional linkages

No public evidence identified of Israeli state equity ownership, a government-appointed VAST board seat, a golden share, or a charter restriction tying VAST to Israeli state policy.^{1, 18} The SDS project is designed to serve national AI initiatives and government-sector customers, but the reviewed sources identify SDS as the infrastructure operator/partner and do not disclose a named Israeli government contract with VAST.^{18, 19, 20}

Structural governance features

No public evidence identified of a state veto, mission lock, government golden share or other governance mechanism structurally subordinating VAST to the Israeli state.^{1, 4} Public financing materials do not disclose a complete ownership/voting schedule, so this is a bounded finding rather than a representation that the full shareholder agreement has been reviewed.^{4, 8}

Profit Repatriation & Economic Contribution

Revenue attribution and profit flows

No public evidence identified of VAST disclosing Israel-specific revenue, Israel-specific profit, Israeli corporate income tax paid, transfer-pricing flows, dividends from the Israeli entity, or a quantified direction of profit repatriation.^{4, 8} The 2026 Series F did include secondary liquidity for existing holders, but a secondary share sale is not evidence that operating profits were repatriated to Israel.⁴

Economic ecosystem role

The company contributes materially to Israel’s technology economy through a core engineering workforce and R&D footprint that accounts for roughly one third of its reported global headcount.^{6, 7, 3} This contribution is structural rather than episodic: it combines longstanding Tel Aviv engineering, Haifa development capacity and Israel-based development/operations leadership.^{6, 7, 3} The 2025 SDS partnership adds a large local infrastructure deployment intended to support Israeli AI workloads and national initiatives.^{18, 19, 20}

In July 2026 CTech reported that VAST and the Tmura Foundation established a NIS 3m scholarship fund for AI and computer-science students at Tel Aviv University, the Technion and the Open University from proceeds associated with VAST equity previously donated to Tmura.²² Fienblit linked the initiative to the continued strength of the Israeli economy and industry.²² The cited source describes education/economic-development support; it does not identify a military, settlement or sovereign-debt recipient.²²

Constructive-notice chronology and settlement nexus

The material Israel-facing economic activity continued after both 19 July 2024 and November 2024. VAST announced the SDS sovereign-AI project on 30 September 2025, announced the Red Stapler acquisition in September 2025 as part of continued global expansion, completed an approximately $1bn Series F in 2026, and continued substantial Israeli R&D/employment into 2026.^{18, 17, 4, 3}

For settlement-specific activity, no public evidence identified of a VAST office, facility, customer deployment, reseller branch, sourcing relationship, real-estate investment or other revenue activity specifically located in an Israeli settlement in the West Bank including East Jerusalem or in the occupied Syrian Golan.^{16, 13} The OHCHR database has a defined mandate and does not constitute an exhaustive record of every commercial relationship, so this negative finding remains limited to the public sources reviewed.¹⁶

Evidence limits

The strongest Economic evidence is the cumulative structural nexus: the Israeli VAST DATA LTD entity dates to December 2015; Tel Aviv was the historic engineering centre; Haifa added a second development centre; roughly one third of VAST’s approximately 1,100 employees were reported in Israel in 2026; and a co-founder leads development and operations there.^{1, 6, 7, 3} That makes Israel a substantial core-R&D and operating base within VAST’s global structure. The post-2024 SDS sovereign-AI infrastructure partnership and continuing Israeli economic/education engagement add further current economic continuity.^{18, 22} The public record also shows multinational financing and substantial U.S./global operations.^{4, 21, 14, 15}

The audit does not establish a current >=10% controlling shareholder, Israeli PTE/Innovation Authority status, Israel-specific revenue/profit/tax payments, a disclosed VAST fee for the SDS project, an Israeli state/security end user, an acquired Israeli operating subsidiary separate from VAST’s own Israeli entity, sovereign-debt financing, or settlement-specific operations. Those issues remain unresolved or negative on the reviewed public record.^{1, 4, 18, 17, 16, 13}