Reviewing Impinj (NASDAQ:PI) & Photronics (NASDAQ:PLAB)

Photronics (NASDAQ:PLAB) and Impinj (NASDAQ:PI) are both technology companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their institutional ownership, risk, profitability, earnings, dividends, analyst recommendations and valuation.

Profitability

This table compares Photronics and Impinj’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Photronics	19.05%	7.45%	6.53%
Impinj	-7.26%	5.23%	2.09%

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings for Photronics and Impinj, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Photronics	0	2	3	1	2.83
Impinj	1	3	7	0	2.55

Photronics currently has a consensus price target of $49.33, suggesting a potential upside of 62.17%. Impinj has a consensus price target of $183.30, suggesting a potential upside of 0.85%. Given Photronics’ stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, research analysts clearly believe Photronics is more favorable than Impinj.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Photronics and Impinj”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Photronics	$849.29 million	2.11	$136.40 million	$2.84	10.71
Impinj	$361.08 million	15.38	-$10.85 million	($0.92)	-197.55

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

Institutional & Insider Ownership

88.4% of Photronics shares are held by institutional investors. 3.3% of Photronics shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 6.8% of Impinj shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Risk & Volatility

Photronics has a beta of 1.35, suggesting that its stock price is 35% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Impinj has a beta of 1.92, suggesting that its stock price is 92% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Photronics beats Impinj on 11 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Photronics

Photronics, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, engages in the manufacture and sale of photomask products and services in the United States, Taiwan, China, Korea, Europe, and internationally. It offers photomasks that are used in the manufacture of integrated circuits and flat panel displays (FPDs); and to transfer circuit patterns onto semiconductor wafers, and FDP substrates. The company offers electrical and optical components. It sells its products to semiconductor and FPD manufacturers, designers, and foundries, as well as to other high-performance electronics manufacturers through its sales personnel and customer service representatives. The company was formerly known as Photronic Labs, Inc. and changed its name to Photronics, Inc. in 1990. Photronics, Inc. was incorporated in 1969 and is based in Brookfield, Connecticut.

About Impinj

Impinj, Inc. operates a cloud connectivity platform in the Americas, the Asia Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. Its platform wirelessly connects items and delivers data about the connected items to business and consumer applications. The company’s platform comprises endpoint ICs, a miniature radios-on-a-chip that attaches to a host item and includes a number to identify the item. Its platform also consists of systems products that consists of reader ICs, readers, and gateways to wirelessly provide power to and communicate bidirectionally with endpoint ICs on host items, as well as to read, write, authenticate, and engage the endpoint ICs on those items; and software and algorithms that enable its partners to solve enterprise business problems, such as retail self-checkout and loss prevention. The company primarily serves retail, supply chain and logistics, automotive, aviation, banking, datacenters, food, healthcare, industrial and manufacturing, linen and uniform tracking, sports, and travel industries through original equipment and device manufacturers, tag service bureaus, systems integrators, value-added resellers, independent software vendors, and other solution partners. Impinj, Inc. was incorporated in 2000 and is headquartered in Seattle, Washington.