Financial Review: Navan (NASDAQ:NAVN) vs. Via Transportation (NYSE:VIA)

Via Transportation (NYSE:VIA) and Navan (NASDAQ:NAVN) are both services companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their risk, valuation, analyst recommendations, dividends, earnings, institutional ownership and profitability.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

74.4% of Via Transportation shares are owned by institutional investors. 66.2% of Via Transportation shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent recommendations for Via Transportation and Navan, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Via Transportation	1	1	12	0	2.79
Navan	1	1	11	1	2.86

Via Transportation presently has a consensus target price of $49.00, indicating a potential upside of 194.05%. Navan has a consensus target price of $24.36, indicating a potential upside of 173.75%. Given Via Transportation’s higher possible upside, equities analysts plainly believe Via Transportation is more favorable than Navan.

Profitability

This table compares Via Transportation and Navan’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Via Transportation	N/A	N/A	N/A
Navan	N/A	N/A	N/A

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Via Transportation and Navan”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Via Transportation	$434.34 million	3.11	-$96.36 million	($0.69)	-24.15
Navan	N/A	N/A	N/A	($1.96)	-4.54

Navan has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Via Transportation. Via Transportation is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Navan, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

Via Transportation beats Navan on 6 of the 9 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Via Transportation

Via transforms antiquated and siloed public transportation systems into smart, data-driven, and efficient digital networks. We are addressing a striking gap in the $545 billion global public transportation market. While billions of people across the globe rely on public transportation, this critical form of mobility has yet to meaningfully benefit from recent advances in technology. Buses still follow fixed routes and schedules planned years, if not decades ago, regardless of actual demand for their service. We can track our pizza from the moment it leaves the oven, but parents of more than 25 million children in the United States have no way of knowing when their child’s school bus will arrive. Some of our most vulnerable citizens, who depend on paratransit to access critical medical care, have no alternative to cumbersome phone reservations that must be made a day or more in advance. Government agencies and private organizations responsible for providing public transportation operate in a complex and demanding environment. They must maintain reliable and affordable service in the face of continuously changing and difficult to predict traffic and ridership patterns. The industry has historically had no option but to rely on fragmented technology systems with limited functional flexibility, aging infrastructure, and poor end-user experience. Rising operating costs and labor shortages have placed a growing strain on budgets. Via’s unified platform of cutting-edge software and technology-enabled services replaces fragmented legacy systems and consolidates operations across silos. When our customers adopt our platform, they can leapfrog years of technology neglect and drive meaningful efficiencies in their operations. Public transportation is deeply local in nature; our highly-configurable vertical stack supports the broad and diverse localization requirements of our customers. The use of machine learning and AI is intrinsic to our platform and underlies continuous improvement in the performance of our software. We offer a curated suite of technology-enabled services that enable customers to more easily adopt our software and benefit from lower-cost operations. In turn, the passengers who live in the communities we serve benefit from an improved rider experience and greater access to opportunity. Our journey to pioneer this category began over a decade ago. We were driven by a simple mission: to create public transportation systems that provide far greater access to jobs, healthcare, and education. Our vision was to reimagine public transit, from a static system of predetermined routes and schedules, to a dynamic network where routes are determined in real time based on passenger demand and data. In 2013, we launched in New York City what was, to our knowledge, the world’s first two-sided marketplace for on-demand shared rides in order to demonstrate the efficacy of this new mode of transportation and begin to build a rich foundation of data to power our algorithms. Out of this marketplace grew a platform so compelling that today it is utilized by hundreds of cities across more than 30 countries. Shaped by feedback from millions of passengers and drivers and informed by data from hundreds of millions of trips, we have developed a proven solution that is reshaping the public transportation landscape. Our platform has expanded well beyond its origins in on-demand shared rides — a new mode of mass transit now known to the world as microtransit — and today offers a comprehensive, end-to-end public transit solution: • Planning and scheduling: Our software enables cities to plan smarter transit networks. By combining multiple disparate operational and demographic data sets, and leveraging billions of data points, our tools provide insights that allow city planners to immediately quantify the impact of potential changes to their transit network. In the Dallas suburbs, the Denton County Transit Authority (“DCTA”) was able to use Via’s planning tools to identify underperforming bus lines and replace them with microtransit. This helped DCTA grow their monthly ridership by approximately five times without increasing operating budget. • Operating Software: We provide a deep, cloud-based vertical platform with the necessary range of tools to manage the operations of dynamic and fixed-route forms of mobility, including microtransit, paratransit, school transport, and non-emergency medical transport. Our technology stack offers modules to digitize and automate workstreams across areas such as program eligibility, government reporting and compliance, real-time dispatch and reservations, and customer support. For example, North Carolina’s GoRaleigh was able to reduce driver overtime by approximately 50% once they switched to Via’s software. • Technology-enabled services: Many of our government customers require additional support in order to adopt modern technology. As a critical part of our go-to-market strategy, we have embedded into our platform a suite of services, vertically integrated into our technology, that complements our powerful software. The services we provide lower barriers to adoption, simplify compliance with complex procurements, support local integration with existing infrastructure, and ultimately meaningfully enhance our ability to deliver successful outcomes. Customers can select from an à la carte menu of services or a full turnkey solution. Examples of services we provide include fleet and driver management, autonomous and electric vehicle management, digital marketing, call center support, and more. In Sarasota, Florida, Breeze Transit used Via to procure a flexible fleet of rental vehicles and independent contractor drivers, allowing them to achieve an approximately 50% reduction in average cost per ride. • Passenger tools: We provide consumer-grade applications for passengers to seamlessly plan, book, and pay for their transit journeys. Our customers have a choice of passenger facing tools. Using Via’s white-labeled apps, governments can engage local audiences with best-in-class, frictionless user experience that faithfully represents their brand. We also offer Citymapper, one of the world’s premier journey planning MaaS (Mobility-as-a-Service) apps, which is used by millions globally. Citymapper achieves arrival / departure time estimates that are, on average, 15% more accurate than industry norms. • Data and insights: We are often able to unlock unprecedented data insights for our customers, allowing them, for example, to understand changing demand patterns and rapidly adapt operational plans to performance reality. Our integrated planning, operating, and passenger tools provide the end-to-end data necessary for the holistic optimization of entire transit systems. Sioux Area Metro was able to increase ridership by 10% while reducing average cost per ride by 13% by leveraging Via’s platform to optimize their network. We are in the early innings of transforming an enormous addressable market. For the quarter ended June 30, 2025, we provided solutions for 689 customers in over 30 countries. This represents approximately 1% of the total addressable market in North America and Western Europe, which we estimate to be approximately 63,000 customers, based on a report commissioned by us from a major consulting firm. Our potential for growth is further evidenced by our current penetration: at our current revenue, we capture less than 1% of our Serviceable Addressable Market (“SAM”) in our two core geographies of North America and Western Europe. More than 90% of our revenue comes from government customers, in most cases represented by a municipality or a local transit agency or authority. We also serve blue-chip corporate and university customers who leverage Via’s platform to power campus transportation solutions. Our founder-led executive team is unique in its long tenure and alignment of mission. We deeply understand the technical and operational challenges that our customers and their end-users face every day. Thanks to our deep knowledge of the complex needs of government customers, we have developed a go-to-market strategy that allows us to efficiently and effectively sell to our customers at scale. We employ a consultative sales process, leveraging our technology to model the impact of our solutions to our customers, allowing them to gain confidence that change can be low-risk and high reward. When customers adopt our platform, the measurable increase in efficiency and ridership can generate a virtuous cycle that leads to growth in contract scope and value over time. Our Platform Net Revenue Retention Rate averaged over 120% in each of the last two years. And, as transit agencies are in many cases part of collaborative multi-government coalitions such as regional planning authorities, customer references are a major driver of our growth. We often see the adoption of our platform by one city or agency quickly leading to adoption by similar customers in the surrounding area. The unique value of our platform is demonstrated by our rapid and sustained growth. From 2021 to 2024, our revenue grew from $100.0 million to $337.6 million, representing a compound annual growth rate of 50%. Our revenue was $248.9 million and $337.6 million for the years ended December 31, 2023 and 2024, respectively, representing a year-over-year increase of 36%. For the six months ended June 30, 2025, our revenue was $205.8 million. Our Platform revenue was $237.3 million and $330.8 million in the year ended December 31, 2023 and 2024, respectively, representing a year-over-year increase of 39%. For the six months ended June 30, 2025, our Platform revenue was $205.8 million. Our Platform segment represented 95%, 98% and 100% of our revenue in the years ended December 31, 2023 and 2024, and the six months ended June 30, 2025, respectively. In addition to our Platform segment, we have one legacy operating segment (which we refer to as our Legacy segment). The Legacy segment had included our historical on-demand shared rides marketplace, which we ceased to operate in 2021, and includes a legacy operational contract, which terminated in June 2024. We no longer earn any revenue from our Legacy segment. Our Platform Annual Run-Rate Revenue of $366.7 million as of December 31, 2024 represented an increase of 37% from December 31, 2023. Our Platform Annual Run-Rate Revenue of $428.5 million as of June 30, 2025 represented an increase of 34% from June 30, 2024. Platform Annual Run-Rate Revenue as of the last date in any quarter represents our Platform revenue for that quarter multiplied by four. Our principal executive offices are located in New York, NY.

About Navan

Travel is more than just getting from point A to point B; it’s the lifeblood of connection in the modern business world. It’s about forging those critical in-person relationships with clients and partners, sparking innovation through team collaboration, and empowering employees to grow and succeed. These moments matter, and they demand a travel experience worthy of their importance. We built Navan for the road warriors, for CEOs and CFOs who understand travel’s critical importance to their strategy, the finance teams who demand precision and control, the executive assistants juggling itineraries, and the program admins ensuring seamless events. Navan is an end-to-end, AI-powered software platform built to simplify the global business T&E experience, benefiting users, customers, and suppliers. From day one, we leveraged technology to reimagine business travel. We built a comprehensive platform that serves as the foundation for further disruption. We deliver delightful, personalized experiences for users, efficiency and control for customers, and direct market access for suppliers—all powered by our proprietary AI framework, Navan Cognition. We saw firsthand the frustration of clunky, outdated systems. Travelers were forced to cobble together solutions, wait for hours on hold to book or change travel, and negotiate with travel agents. They struggled to adhere to company policies, with little visibility into those policies, and after all that, they spent even more time on tedious expense reports after a trip. We felt the pain of finance teams struggling to gain visibility into fragmented travel spending and to enforce policies, and the frustration of suppliers unable to connect directly with the high-value business travelers they sought to serve. Navan challenges this status quo by putting all three constituents—users, customers, and suppliers—at the heart of an integrated global platform. With Navan, users enjoy intuitive, AI-powered booking that anticipates users’ needs and takes a fraction of the time of legacy booking systems. Users also get expense management and clear policy guidance built-in. Customers gain real-time visibility, cost control, and safety oversight, and suppliers gain direct access to the customers who matter most. Instead of having to compromise, every group benefits, and the whole network becomes greater than the sum of its parts. Navan was built on the premise that to win, all players in the ecosystem must be integrated on one platform with AI at its core. Our platform was built from the ground up to connect distinct stakeholders, and unify traditionally disparate product features, through a single system that unlocks new efficiencies and experiences. By building true connectivity into the core of its cohesive offering, Navan is unlocking a smarter, more rewarding future for travel—one where everyone wins. The Navan platform creates a powerful flywheel effect where the user, customer, and supplier benefits reinforce each other. Our enterprise-grade platform is characterized by its intuitive design, ease of use, and tangible time-saving features, which foster a user-centric experience that travelers genuinely appreciate. This is reflected in our overall CSAT score of 96%, our virtual agent CSAT score of 78%, which is on par with human agent performance, and NPS of 43, each for the six months ended July 31, 2025. When frequent travelers have a positive, efficient experience and earn rewards, they are more likely to use Navan. The increased adoption gives the customer greater visibility into spending, stronger policy control, and cost savings, making them more invested in the platform. This, in turn, attracts more suppliers who want access to our large and loyal user base. With more suppliers and inventory available, we can offer better options and competitive pricing, further enhancing the experience for frequent travelers. This virtuous cycle strengthens each flywheel, creating a robust and self-sustaining ecosystem. Our proprietary infrastructure, which we call Navan Cloud, enables us to provide global, real-time inventory for users and forms the foundation of our platform. We aggregate supply through direct supplier relationships, real-time API integrations, and a robust network of partnerships. From day one, Navan has leveraged artificial intelligence as a cornerstone of our platform. We built Navan Cognition, a new paradigm in AI-powered travel management. This proprietary framework enables us to create, train, deploy, and supervise specialized virtual agents that can handle many complex tasks previously requiring human intervention. We make every step of the pre-booking, in-travel, and post-trip process as delightful and automated as possible. In fiscal 2025, 90% of bookings were made online or through mobile applications on the Navan platform. Our users on average are able to book a trip in seven minutes, far faster than the industry average of 45 minutes, according to Booking.com. And, in the majority of cases, users can resolve trip changes with a virtual agent, which Navan was one of the first in its industry to offer. Our strategy is to land a customer with our Travel offering, delight our users and customers, broaden their engagement with Navan, and seek to manage all of their payments, expenses, VIP needs, meetings and events, and bleisure travel on our platform. As of January 31, 2025, 36% of our customers attached to three or more offerings. Because Navan unifies all aspects of travel in one system, it is used by employees across departments and seniority levels, driving deep organizational adoption. This integrated approach streamlines trip planning, digitizes in-trip expenses, and automates post-trip reconciliation, all while enhancing the overall customer experience. Our platform also provides actionable analytics and intelligence for managers to monitor and approve travel and entertainment spend in real-time. Our platform is easy-to-use, yet powerful enough to address customers of all sizes across any industry vertical. Our proprietary AI framework, Navan Cognition, significantly enhances support capabilities and has improved our gross margins, while leveraging powerful technology capabilities across our platform, making Navan an increasingly formidable competitor. Our principal executive offices are located in Palo Alto, California.