Comparing BrightView (NYSE:BV) and Bright Horizons Family Solutions (NYSE:BFAM)

Bright Horizons Family Solutions (NYSE:BFAM) and BrightView (NYSE:BV) are both business services companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their dividends, analyst recommendations, risk, valuation, profitability, institutional ownership and earnings.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Bright Horizons Family Solutions and BrightView”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Bright Horizons Family Solutions	$2.69 billion	2.16	$140.19 million	$3.48	29.47
BrightView	$2.67 billion	0.47	$56.00 million	$0.04	328.88

Bright Horizons Family Solutions has higher revenue and earnings than BrightView. Bright Horizons Family Solutions is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than BrightView, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

92.4% of BrightView shares are held by institutional investors. 1.2% of Bright Horizons Family Solutions shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 2.2% of BrightView shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings for Bright Horizons Family Solutions and BrightView, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Bright Horizons Family Solutions	1	4	3	0	2.25
BrightView	1	3	2	2	2.63

Bright Horizons Family Solutions presently has a consensus target price of $128.29, indicating a potential upside of 25.10%. BrightView has a consensus target price of $14.70, indicating a potential upside of 11.74%. Given Bright Horizons Family Solutions’ higher probable upside, equities analysts plainly believe Bright Horizons Family Solutions is more favorable than BrightView.

Profitability

This table compares Bright Horizons Family Solutions and BrightView’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Bright Horizons Family Solutions	6.98%	17.07%	5.99%
BrightView	2.10%	8.43%	3.21%

Volatility & Risk

Bright Horizons Family Solutions has a beta of 1.41, indicating that its share price is 41% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, BrightView has a beta of 1.28, indicating that its share price is 28% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Bright Horizons Family Solutions beats BrightView on 10 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Bright Horizons Family Solutions

Bright Horizons Family Solutions Inc. provides early education and childcare, back-up care, educational advisory, and other workplace solutions services for employers and families in the United States, Puerto Rico, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Australia, and India. The company operates in three segments: Full Service Center-Based Child Care, Back-Up Care, and Educational Advisory and Other Services. The Full Service Center-Based Child Care segment offers traditional center-based child care and early education, preschool, and elementary education services. The Back-Up Care segment provides center-based back-up child care, in-home child and adult/elder dependent care, school-age camps, virtual tutoring, and self-sourced reimbursed care services through child care centers, school-age campuses, and in-home caregivers, as well as the back-up care network. The Educational Advisory and Other Services segment offers tuition assistance and student loan repayment program administration, workforce education, and related educational consulting services, as well as college admissions and college financial advisory services. The company was formerly known as Bright Horizons Solutions Corp. and changed its name to Bright Horizons Family Solutions Inc. in July 2012. Bright Horizons Family Solutions Inc. was founded in 1986 and is headquartered in Newton, Massachusetts.

About BrightView

BrightView Holdings, Inc., through its subsidiaries, provides commercial landscaping services in the United States. It operates through two segments, Maintenance Services and Development Services. The Maintenance Services segment delivers a suite of recurring commercial landscaping services, including mowing, gardening, mulching and snow removal, water management, irrigation maintenance, tree care, golf course maintenance, and specialty turf maintenance. Its customers' properties include corporate and commercial properties, homeowners associations, public parks, hotels and resorts, airport authorities, municipalities, hospitals and other healthcare facilities, educational institutions, restaurants and retail, and golf courses. This segment's customer base includes approximately 8,800 office parks and corporate campuses 7,100 residential communities, and 550 educational institutions. The Development Services segment offers landscape architecture and development services for new facilities and redesign projects. Its services include project design and management services, landscape architecture and installation, irrigation installation, tree moving and installation, pool and water features, sports field, and other services. BrightView Holdings, Inc. also operates as official field consultant to various league baseball. The company was founded in 1939 and is headquartered in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania.