Bidness ETC - Is Fitbit Following GoPro's Footsteps?

Fitbit has growth potential that can make them sail swiftly in the long run.

Fitbit Inc. has become a favorite stock of several investors whose shares have now experienced a 50 percent surge when they traded on the first day. Many anticipate that the company has the potential to become the next GoPro Inc. the action camera giant considering how the company’s stocks have been performing.

Fitbit in a short span of time has intrigued its audience. The company is known for producing fitness gadgets that are used to keep a track of user activity like food, health habits, weight etc. that will help users to improve their health.

The company was established in FY07 and since then it has been growing significantly. In FY14, the company recorded a net income of $131.8 million that has helped them offset a loss of $51.6 million in FY13; moreover Fitbit’s revenue has also improved substantially having an impressive growth trajectory. It has been “recorded at $745.4 million in 2014, a growth of 175% from $271.1 million in 2013.”

The market cap for the company is $6.69 billion along with the stock price to be $32.5. However, GoPro resides at $7.8 billion. Fitbit at this point needs to be consistent with its service since it has to face several major competitors that are extremely well established like Samsung Group, Apple Inc., and Microsoft Corporation etc. The reason why these firms are a massive threat to the integrity of Fitbit is that these organizations have better infrastructures, facilities, brand image that Fitbit lacks currently.

It is mere injustice to compare Fitbit with industry giants but it needs to be judged on another threshold that governs its standing. Fitbit has a strong hardware offering along with a strong data platform that ensures business to business collaboration.

As reported, after the IPO for the company was being priced at $2, which is commendable , a jump of $32.50 is pretty great considering the limited resources they have and keeping in mind the constant flux of new products, researches and innovations the company often faces. The company has an impressing $7billion market cap from the end of the tech wearable market being about $20 billion.

GoPro when it was launched observed an extremely positive response and its stocks saw a 100 percent increase in the first week only. This is merely because hardware products tend to penetrate at a faster pace making them highly sought after.

Hence in a nutshell, Fitbit does have potential and can follow the trajectory of GoPro all it needs to do is consistently offer top notch services.

Bidness Etc - GoPro Experiences A Rise In Stock Value

The action camera makers have witnessed a rise in share price after going through a difficult financial time on the stock index.

In the most recent GoPro news, it was seen that the company traded right up after the action camera makers received a ‘buy’ rating from the analysts of Dougherty & Co. Previously, the same equity firm has given a ‘neutral’ rating to the stock of the company. The analysts have also presented the company with a price target of $55. This has been a surprising factor for the analysts as the share value of the camera making company has faced a serious downfall since the sales in the holiday season. The downfall has been recorded by the financial firms to have come around at 34%.

As for GoPro’s stock news, analysts at Wall Street have high expectations from GoPro as well as they have made predictions for the current year’s quarter earnings and they are expecting the earnings per share to come around at $1.38. The camera making company has been trading on a lower share price than expected and analysts believe that if the company continues to trade in this manner then a price target of $55 will be deemed as a fair target.

The diluted earnings of GoPro have increased over the period of time and it has been predicted that the revenue generated by the company might also increase. Previously, the diluted earnings of the company saw a rise by a massive 164% whereas the sales revenue increased by 41%. So far, Hero camera producers have been going through a difficult fiscal time which is why analysts have made predictions in which a rise of only 4.5% is expected in the growth of the earnings.

Analysts believe that GoPro is a company which is difficult to analyze as it does not have any company that works in its competition. Other cameras producing companies are Nikon and Canon who make cameras quite opposite to what the action camera makers are working on. These cameras are very different from the other kinds of the camera being produced in the industry as they are fast action cameras. According to analysts, at IDC, it is to be believed that the company currently owns around 57% of the action camera used all over the globe.

In the near future, it has been guided by analysts of Futuresource Consulting that GoPro will be witnessing a rise in demand in action cameras as the shipments are expected to rise massively before 2018.

It is to be noted that both Nikon and Canon were seen to step into the action camera making department but failed miserably to make a mark in the industry, bringing no change whatsoever in GoPro’s camera standing in the market.