Spotting undeniable trends in society can be an excellent starting point for finding investments with multibagger potential. Ranging from technological breakthroughs to products that genuinely lead to a better future for all involved, the stocks benefiting from these trends can offer once-in-a-lifetime investing opportunities.
Today we will look at two companies that fit this description perfectly, offering investors great growth options through products that are quickly becoming indispensable.
Image source: Axon Enterprise.
1. Axon Enterprise
With a stated goal of trying to protect life, capture truth, and accelerate justice, Axon Enterprise (AXON -0.74%) is developing products and software that are quickly becoming vital for law enforcement agencies across the globe. Its offerings are focused on public safety, and one could argue that Axon is gaining in importance because it is providing a much-needed societal value in difficult times.
Axon gained its initial notoriety for developing and selling tasers, but it has since expanded its product line to include body cameras, vehicle cameras, drones, and the software to capture and store the video content from those cameras. Its products have been a win-win for law enforcement and civilians alike in documenting police interactions with the public. Simply put, Axon adds all-important transparency with its cameras and layers of safety with its nonlethal weapons used to resolve potentially dangerous situations.
This win-win between Axon's customers (law enforcement) and civilians as a whole has helped the company grow revenue by 26% annually over the last four years. The rapid adoption of its products has caught investors' eyes and Axon has seen its stock price rise by over 500% over this same time.
Perhaps most important to investors, the company has seen even faster growth from its younger Axon Cloud unit, which posted quarterly sales growth of 39% year over year for the third quarter. Axon Cloud helps law enforcement departments store, analyze, and manage the video captured from body and vehicle cams. This unit is essential as it is a subscription service and offers incredibly sticky and recurring software-as-a-service (SaaS) revenue.
As all of Axon's products send their usage information and data back to the cloud, this unit has quietly but quickly become the driving force behind its long-term growth story. With a dollar-based net retention rate (DBNR) of 119% for the last four quarters, the company has not only been adding new customers but also seeing its cloud usage expand within its existing customer base. DBNR is a great way to measure customer churn. Results above 120% are outstanding for SaaS companies, making Axon's consistent marks at 119% very impressive.
Currently, Axon stock trades with a market capitalization, or company price tag, of $12 billion and a forward price-to-earnings (P/E) of 86, making it rather expensive. But when you consider that Axon's target addressable market is $52 billion annually, the company looks to be a potentially excellent investment.
2. DocuSign
While most people are familiar with DocuSign's (DOCU -1.76%) market-leading eSignature product, the company's broader Agreement Cloud quietly leads its land-and-expand business model. This Agreement Cloud consists of four units: prepare, sign, act, and manage.
Together, DocuSign estimates that the sign unit has a target addressable market (TAM) of $25 billion, while the prepare, act, and manage units combine for an additional TAM of $25 billion. Compared to the company's trailing-12-month revenue of $1.8 billion, it has only just begun expanding into its broader market, despite its leadership position in eSignatures.
Buoyed by its Net Promoter Score (NPS) of +72, DocuSign's eSignature product helps it flawlessly execute the land portion of its land-and-expand model. NPS measures customer satisfaction with a product on a scale of -100 to +100 -- the higher the rating, the better. With its NPS of +72, the company has roughly eight promoters of its eSignature product for every detractor or unsatisfied customer, one of the highest scores in the tech industry.
Now with over 1 million customers using its products, DocuSign has its sights set on the expand portion of its land-and-expand model -- and the early results are promising. Posting a DBNR of 124% for its second quarter, the company has recorded five consecutive quarters of 120% or higher for this metric. As previously mentioned, anytime DBNR is above 120%, it is an excellent sign that the company is successfully expanding its sales within its existing customer base.
Ultimately, pairing its beloved core product eSignature with the company's promising DBNR, DocuSign looks poised to show how powerful a successful land-and-expand business model can be for investors.
While the company's market capitalization of $50 billion and forward P/E of 115 already show high expectations for continued growth, DocuSign has positioned itself beautifully to continue building out its entire Agreement Cloud over the long term, giving this stock some real potential for further growth.
