Critical Survey: BlackBerry (BB) versus The Competition

BlackBerry (NYSE:BB) is one of 953 public companies in the “Software” industry, but how does it compare to its peers? We will compare BlackBerry to similar businesses based on the strength of its analyst recommendations, profitability, valuation, institutional ownership, earnings, risk and dividends.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares BlackBerry and its peers top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
BlackBerry	$549.10 million	$53.20 million	72.88
BlackBerry Competitors	$1.79 billion	$385.91 million	106.78

BlackBerry’s peers have higher revenue and earnings than BlackBerry. BlackBerry is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than its peers, indicating that it is currently more affordable than other companies in its industry.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

54.5% of BlackBerry shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 41.8% of shares of all “Software” companies are owned by institutional investors. 0.5% of BlackBerry shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 19.9% of shares of all “Software” companies are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of recent ratings for BlackBerry and its peers, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
BlackBerry	0	7	2	0	2.22
BlackBerry Competitors	5747	21523	44878	1497	2.57

BlackBerry currently has a consensus target price of $9.86, suggesting a potential upside of 12.72%. As a group, “Software” companies have a potential upside of 28.87%. Given BlackBerry’s peers stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe BlackBerry has less favorable growth aspects than its peers.

Volatility & Risk

BlackBerry has a beta of 2.23, suggesting that its stock price is 123% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, BlackBerry’s peers have a beta of 1.21, suggesting that their average stock price is 21% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares BlackBerry and its peers’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
BlackBerry	13.09%	13.71%	8.36%
BlackBerry Competitors	-612.64%	20.88%	-8.99%

Summary

BlackBerry peers beat BlackBerry on 9 of the 13 factors compared.

About BlackBerry

BlackBerry Limited provides intelligent security software and services to enterprises and governments worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Cybersecurity, IoT, and Licensing and Other. The company offers CylanceENDPOINT, an integrated endpoint security solution; CylanceGUARD, a managed detection and response solution; CylanceEDGE, an AI-powered continuous authentication zero trust network access solution; CylanceINTELLIGENCE, a contextual cyber threat intelligence service; BlackBerry Dynamics offers a development platform and secure container for mobile applications; BlackBerry Workspaces a secure Enterprise File Sync and Share (EFSS) solution; BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) Enterprise, an enterprise-grade secure instant messaging solution for messaging, voice and video; BlackBerry SecuSUITE is a certified, multi-OS voice and text messaging solution; BlackBerry AtHoc, a secure networked critical event management solution; and BlackBerry unified endpoint management (UEM) solutions. It also provides BlackBerry Technology Solutions (BTS); BlackBerry Certicom, a patented elliptic curve cryptography, which provides device security, anti-counterfeiting and product authentication solutions; BlackBerry Radar offers monitoring and telematics solutions; BlackBerry Professional; and cyber security consulting services. In addition, the company is involved in the patent licensing and legacy service access fees business. The company was formerly known as Research In Motion Limited and changed its name to BlackBerry Limited in July 2013. BlackBerry Limited was incorporated in 1984 and is headquartered in Waterloo, Canada.