Planet Labs PBC (NYSE:PL) & SES (OTCMKTS:SGBAF) Critical Comparison

Planet Labs PBC (NYSE:PL) and SES (OTCMKTS:SGBAF) are both mid-cap computer and technology companies, but which is the superior business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their valuation, profitability, dividends, risk, institutional ownership, earnings and analyst recommendations.

Risk & Volatility

Planet Labs PBC has a beta of 1.8, indicating that its stock price is 80% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, SES has a beta of 0.71, indicating that its stock price is 29% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Planet Labs PBC and SES”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Planet Labs PBC	$244.35 million	8.72	-$123.20 million	($0.36)	-19.50
SES	$2.17 billion	1.89	$16.23 million	($0.10)	-73.49

SES has higher revenue and earnings than Planet Labs PBC. SES is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Planet Labs PBC, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

41.7% of Planet Labs PBC shares are held by institutional investors. 18.9% of Planet Labs PBC shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings and target prices for Planet Labs PBC and SES, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Planet Labs PBC	0	1	9	0	2.90
SES	0	2	0	1	2.67

Planet Labs PBC currently has a consensus price target of $6.71, suggesting a potential downside of 4.42%. Given Planet Labs PBC’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, research analysts clearly believe Planet Labs PBC is more favorable than SES.

Profitability

This table compares Planet Labs PBC and SES’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Planet Labs PBC	-42.58%	-23.36%	-16.51%
SES	-1.45%	3.78%	1.38%

Summary

Planet Labs PBC beats SES on 8 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Planet Labs PBC

Planet Labs PBC engages in the design, construction, and launch constellations of satellites with the intent of providing high cadence geospatial data delivered to customers through an online platform worldwide. The company’s platform offers planet monitoring, basemap, tasking, apps, and application programming interfaces, as well as analytics and planetary variables. It serves agriculture, mapping, energy, forestry, finance and insurance companies, and government agencies. The company was founded in 2010 and is headquartered in San Francisco, California.

About SES

SES S.A. provides satellite-based data transmission capacity and ancillary services worldwide. The company offers content connectivity solutions, including network spanning satellite and ground infrastructure to create, deliver, and manage video and data solutions. It also provides data connectivity services through its fleet of geostationary earth orbit and medium earth orbit satellites to the aviation, cloud, cruise, energy, government, maritime, and telco and mobile network operator industries. In addition, the company offers video services, which includes end-to-end managed services to audience; and provides multi-screen and multi-device viewing experiences on linear channels, video-on-demand, streaming platforms, and social media sites for broadcasters, platform operators, and sports organizations. Further, it provides linear video aggregation and distribution, such as direct-to-home, direct-to-cable, and internet protocol TV households; channel management solutions comprising playout; and live feeds and redundancy features. The company was formerly known as SES Global SA and changed its name to SES S.A. in December 2006. SES S.A. was founded in 1985 and is headquartered in Betzdorf, Luxembourg.