GoPro, Inc. GPRO recently introduced live streaming services for its premium subscribers in a bid to enhance the customer connect program and improve its sagging share prices. However, the news seemingly failed to evoke a positive investor sentiment as, despite an initial uptrend, the stocks continued to tread south.
The high-quality live streaming option will be available to about 40,000 GoPro Plus subscribers, enabling them to upload unlimited photos and videos right from their phones to the cloud. This, in turn, will help subscribers reduce their dependency on third-party services such as Amazon.com, Inc.’s AMZN Twitch, Alphabet Inc.’s GOOGL YouTube or Facebook, Inc. FB.
The service can be availed in HERO8 Black, HERO7 Black and MAX cameras and adds value to the long list of subscription benefits on offer, namely unlimited original quality cloud storage of GoPro footage, no-questions-asked camera replacement and up to 50% off on GoPro’s mounts and accessories along with a new line of backpacks and travel bags. The subscriptions are priced at a monthly fee of $4.99 or $49.99 on a yearly basis.
Notably, GoPro faced multiple operational stumbles, including product recalls, messed up launches, production delays and missed deadlines in the past. As of Jun 30, 2020, GoPro had $142.2 million in inventory compared with $129.2 million on Jun 30, 2019. Despite high customer demand, the action video camera maker’s global distribution network has been severely impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result, there was a year-over-year increase in inventory levels.
In order to tide over the storm, GoPro intends to transform itself from the ‘camera maker’ to ‘content maker’ and has taken significant steps to diversify into higher-margin businesses, including video editing and virtual reality. The company is developing various types of software solutions and hardware to curtail the complexity of managing, editing and sharing content on different media platforms. GoPro’s app, Quik, enables users to instantly edit GoPro footage on their phones and create short videos for networking sites like Facebook and Instagram. The company also launched QuikStories, a new GoPro App feature that automatically copies footage from the user’s GoPro to their phone, and the GoPro App then creates a ready-to-share video.
Additionally, the company is marketing the combined GoPro and smartphone experience to its existing community, which is focused on out-of-home, paid search and rich media OTT videos designed to funnel conversions. It plans to enhance its Plus subscription service through enhanced benefits and user awareness and aims to work more closely with its retail partners in North America and abroad. The company is also making investments in merchandising and retail advertising to drive the brand presence while continuing to innovate. It intends to expand footprint in emerging markets like India and remains focused on scaling its CRM efforts to augment the customer base. We believe that these efforts will pay off in the long term and go a long way toward opening GoPro to a wider audience and expanding its user base.
Over the past year, the stock has gained 18.6% compared with the industry’s rise of 30.3%.
GoPro currently has a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
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