Critical Survey: Knightscope (NASDAQ:KSCP) and HNI (NYSE:HNI)

Knightscope (NASDAQ:KSCP) and HNI (NYSE:HNI) are both industrials companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their dividends, valuation, risk, profitability, analyst recommendations, earnings and institutional ownership.

Volatility & Risk

Knightscope has a beta of 1.38, suggesting that its stock price is 38% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, HNI has a beta of 0.94, suggesting that its stock price is 6% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings and recommmendations for Knightscope and HNI, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Knightscope	1	0	3	0	2.50
HNI	0	1	1	0	2.50

Knightscope currently has a consensus price target of $12.67, indicating a potential upside of 2,568.35%. HNI has a consensus price target of $65.00, indicating a potential upside of 37.47%. Given Knightscope’s higher possible upside, equities research analysts plainly believe Knightscope is more favorable than HNI.

Valuation and Earnings

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

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Knightscope	$11.34 million	0.98	-$33.81 million	($3.43)	-0.14
HNI	$2.84 billion	1.20	$54.20 million	$0.44	107.46

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

Institutional & Insider Ownership

14.6% of Knightscope shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 75.3% of HNI shares are held by institutional investors. 1.8% of Knightscope shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 2.1% of HNI shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Profitability

This table compares Knightscope and HNI’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Knightscope	-217.29%	-152.20%	-90.99%
HNI	1.00%	15.39%	5.76%

Summary

HNI beats Knightscope on 9 of the 12 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Knightscope

Knightscope, Inc. designs, develops, manufactures, markets, deploys, and supports autonomous security robots (ASR) in the United States. Its products include K3 and K5 ASRs designed to roam a geo-fenced area autonomously by utilizing numerous sensors and lasers, either on a random basis or based on a particular patrolling algorithm to navigate around people, vehicles, and objects in dynamic indoor or outdoor environments; K1, an ASR for used in indoors or outdoors and at ingress/egress points for both people and vehicles; and K7, a multi-terrain ASR. The company also develops and operates the Knightscope security operations center (KSOC), a browser-based interface, which allows real-time data access service to its clients for alert of an abnormal event; and Knightscope network operations center (KNOC), a custom set of tools that enables it to manage and monitor the network of ASRs with alerts related to critical indicators and statistics, including charging, software, navigation, and temperatures, as well as to execute over-the-air software upgrades, patches, and other related items. In addition, it offers Knightscope+, a virtual monitoring and response solution that provides an alternative for client sites. The company serves airports, commercial real estate, corporate campus, homeowner associations, hotels, universities, municipalities, rail, healthcare, public parks, schools, casinos, corporations, logistics, manufacturing, law enforcement, Parking areas, municipalities, universities, and property management companies, as well as the U.S. federal government. Knightscope, Inc. was incorporated in 2013 and is headquartered in Mountain View, California.

About HNI

HNI Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, engages in the manufacture, sale, and marketing of workplace furnishings and residential building products primarily in the United States and Canada. The company operates through two segments, Workplace Furnishings and Residential Building Products. The Workplace Furnishings segment offers a range of commercial and home office furniture, including panel-based and freestanding furniture systems, seating, storage, benching, tables, architectural products, and ancillary and hospitality products, as well as social collaborative items under the HON, Allsteel, Beyond, Gunlocke, HBF, HBF Textiles, HNI India, Kimball, National, Etc., Interwoven, David Edward, Kimball Hospitality, and D'style brands. This segment sells its products through independent office products dealers, wholesalers, office product distributors, e-commerce focused resellers, and wholesalers, as well as directly to end-user customers and governments. The Residential Building Products segment provides various gas, wood, electric, and pellet-fueled prefabricated fireplaces; and inserts, hearth stoves, facings, outdoor fire pits and fire tables, and accessories. This segment sells its products primarily for home use under the Heatilator, Heat & Glo, Majestic, Monessen, Quadra-Fire, Harman, Vermont Castings, PelPro, Stellar, SimpliFire, The Outdoor GreatRoom Company, and Forge & Flame brand names through independent dealers and distributors, and corporation-owned distribution and retail outlets. The company was incorporated in 1944 and is headquartered in Muscatine, Iowa.