Financial Survey: ams-OSRAM (OTCMKTS:AMSSY) and nLight (NASDAQ:LASR)

ams-OSRAM (OTCMKTS:AMSSY) and nLight (NASDAQ:LASR) are both mid-cap computer and technology companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their risk, institutional ownership, earnings, dividends, valuation, profitability and analyst recommendations.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

83.9% of nLight shares are held by institutional investors. 3.1% of nLight shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent recommendations for ams-OSRAM and nLight, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
ams-OSRAM	1	2	1	0	2.00
nLight	1	1	9	1	2.83

nLight has a consensus target price of $69.06, suggesting a potential upside of 6.69%. Given nLight’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe nLight is more favorable than ams-OSRAM.

Profitability

This table compares ams-OSRAM and nLight’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
ams-OSRAM	-6.18%	0.79%	0.11%
nLight	-5.08%	-4.18%	-3.20%

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares ams-OSRAM and nLight”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
ams-OSRAM	$3.76 billion	0.61	-$147.08 million	($1.19)	-9.71
nLight	$261.33 million	13.97	-$23.47 million	($0.30)	-215.77

nLight has lower revenue, but higher earnings than ams-OSRAM. nLight is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than ams-OSRAM, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Risk & Volatility

ams-OSRAM has a beta of 1.72, meaning that its stock price is 72% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, nLight has a beta of 2.31, meaning that its stock price is 131% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

nLight beats ams-OSRAM on 11 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About ams-OSRAM

ams-OSRAM AG designs, manufactures, and sells LED and optical sensor solutions in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Americas, and Asia/Pacific. The company operates in Semiconductors and Lamps & Systems segments. The Semiconductors segment offers semiconductor-based products and solutions, such as high-performance LEDs, lasers, and optical sensors for automotive, consumer, and industrial and medical technology end markets. The Lamps & Systems segment provides lamps and lighting systems for the automotive, industrial, and medical end markets. The company was formerly known as ams AG and changed its name to ams-OSRAM AG in January 2022. ams-OSRAM AG is headquartered in Premstätten, Austria.

About nLight

nLIGHT, Inc. designs, develops, manufactures, and sells semiconductor and fiber lasers for industrial, microfabrication, and aerospace and defense applications. The company operates in two segments, Laser Products and Advanced Development. It offers semiconductor lasers with various ranges of power levels, wavelengths, and output fiber sizes; and programmable and serviceable fiber lasers for use in industrial and aerospace and defense applications. The company also provides laser sensors, including light detection and ranging technologies for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance applications; and fiber amplifiers, beam combination, and control systems for use in high-energy laser systems in directed energy applications. It sells its products through direct sales force in the United States, China, South Korea, and European countries, as well as through independent sales representatives and distributors in Asia, Australia, Europe, the Middle East, and South America. The company was formerly known as nLight Photonics Corporation and changed its name to nLIGHT, Inc. in January 2016. nLIGHT, Inc. was incorporated in 2000 and is headquartered in Camas, Washington.