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Artificial intelligence ("AI") stocks have been on a roller coaster in 2025, with investors weighing huge growth opportunities against volatile financial performance. Two of the more widely followed small-cap names in this space—SoundHound AI SOUN and BigBear.ai BBAI—are capturing attention for very different reasons. SoundHound has emerged as a leader in voice-enabled AI for enterprises, restaurants, and automakers, while BigBear.ai has positioned itself as a national security-focused AI solutions provider for government and critical infrastructure. The common thread between them is that both companies are striving to leverage differentiated AI platforms in high-stakes industries with large addressable markets.
Both companies gained attention amid the AI stock boom, and each just reported its second-quarter 2025 earnings, making now an ideal time to compare their prospects. They share the common theme of leveraging AI to transform traditional sectors, and each has touted significant opportunities ahead. However, their recent results and trajectories differ markedly, raising the question: which stock offers more upside from here?
Let's dive deep and closely compare the fundamentals of the two stocks to determine which one is a better investment now.
SoundHound AI has positioned itself as a leader in voice-enabled AI, and its technology is gaining real traction across industries. The company’s core platform allows businesses to add conversational voice assistants to their products – from automotive infotainment systems to restaurant drive-thru kiosks and banking apps. This focus translated into explosive top-line growth.
SoundHound’s second-quarter 2025 performance was nothing short of stellar, with revenues surging 217% year over year to roughly $42.7 million, handily surpassing consensus expectations. Growth was fueled by rapid expansion in the quick-service restaurant ("QSR") vertical, where SoundHound has rolled out AI-enabled ordering to more than 14,000 restaurant locations, adding customers like IHOP and Red Lobster while deepening ties with Chipotle and MOD Pizza. This restaurant adoption positions SoundHound as an early leader in automating voice-based transactions at scale—a potentially massive market given the labor shortage in the sector. Thanks to these outstanding results, management raised its 2025 revenue outlook to $160–$178 million, nearly doubling the $84.7 million achieved in 2024. Such rapid growth reflects robust demand for SoundHound’s voice AI solutions and has instilled confidence in its trajectory. (read more: SoundHound Q2 Earnings Beat as AI Demand Fuels 217% Sales Growth).
Beyond restaurants, the company is leveraging its proprietary Polaris foundation model and Amelia 7 agentic AI platform to enhance cross-vertical adoption. These tools are showing traction in automotive and retail partnerships, particularly as Voice Commerce gains momentum. The model envisions a seamless ecosystem where consumer interactions in cars or stores naturally flow into merchant transactions—creating recurring monetization opportunities (read more: SoundHound Stock Soars 49% Since Q2 Earnings: Should You Still Buy?).
Despite its strong technology and sales momentum, SoundHound is still an emerging tech firm with ongoing challenges. Like many young AI companies, it remains unprofitable and continues to burn cash as it scales. It also faces formidable competition from tech giants, including Amazon’s AMZN Alexa, Alphabet’s GOOGL Google Assistant, and Apple’s Siri, all of which invest heavily in voice AI, potentially pressuring independent players.
BigBear.ai is a smaller company, but one that has carved out a notable presence in AI for government and enterprise. It describes itself as a pure-play AI provider with core expertise in “decision intelligence” – essentially using AI and machine learning to help organizations make better decisions with their data. BigBear’s solutions are applied in critical areas like defense, intelligence, cybersecurity, logistics and supply chain management, usually through U.S. government or military contracts. This niche focus led to significant contract wins and a swelling pipeline of future work.
The company’s second-quarter 2025 results revealed both the promise of its mission-critical defense analytics role and the hurdles of scaling profitably. Revenues fell year over year to around $39.8 million, missing expectations and underscoring execution headwinds (read more: BBAI Stock Tumbles on Q2 Loss, Revenues Decline Y/Y, '25 View Down).
On the positive side, BigBear.ai’s positioning within national security remains a unique moat. The company provides AI-enabled solutions for defense readiness, logistics, and intelligence analysis—areas likely to benefit from long-term government and Department of Defense funding. Its proprietary platforms, such as veriScan for identity verification and ConductorOS for operational analytics, provide differentiation in specialized use cases where few commercial players compete.
However, BigBear.ai’s growth remains uneven, with heavy reliance on government contracts and budgets causing lumpy revenues. Despite promising long-term prospects, near-term performance is weak, with losses mounting. Management flagged delays in Army platform transitions and withdrew 2025 adjusted EBITDA guidance, citing softer revenues and higher investments that could pressure results until new awards come through (read more: BigBear.ai Stock Down 21% Since Q2 Earnings: Should You Buy the Dip?).
SoundHound’s stock soared a staggering 836% in 2024 amid rapid revenue growth, and BigBear.ai likewise surged almost 108%. This explosive upside, however, has been followed by extreme volatility.
Over the past month, SoundHound shares have gained 11.8%, performing much better than BigBear.ai. BBAI stock has plunged 23.1% during the same time frame. SoundHound's share price performance for the past month reflects strong upward momentum, outperforming in its sector.
1-Month Share Price Performance
After its spectacular run last year, SoundHound’s valuation became quite rich, higher than that of its industry. Even after pulling back, the stock trades around a 25.91X forward 12-month price-to-sales (P/S) ratio – a steep multiple for a firm still posting losses.
The good news is that the company raised 2025 revenue guidance to $160–$178 million, with an aim for adjusted EBITDA profitability by year-end. So rapid growth could help boost this valuation over time.
BBAI is trading at 12.93X, lower than the industry’s 17.4X and below SoundHound’s hefty multiple. BigBear’s cheaper sales multiple alone isn’t enough to deem it a bargain, given its slow growth and ongoing challenges.
Analysts are growing increasingly optimistic about SOUN’s earnings potential. Over the past 30 days, the Zacks Consensus Estimate for SOUN’s 2025 loss per share has narrowed to 13 cents per share from 16 cents, reflecting a positive shift in sentiment.
For SOUN Stock
For BBAI Stock
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2025 loss per share is pegged at $1.10, which has widened from 41 cents in the past 30 days.
The contrast in growth rates is notable — for 2025, the analysts expect BigBear’s revenues to decline 16.2% to $132.5 million, whereas SoundHound is aiming to roughly double its revenue this year to $165.6 million (up 95.6%). This slower growth trajectory, coupled with ongoing losses, makes investors cautious in the short term for BBAI stock.
After weighing both companies, SoundHound AI appears to have the clearer edge in upside potential heading into 2025. The fundamental differences are striking – SoundHound is delivering rapid revenue growth and expanding into new deals across industries, and it benefits from a strong balance sheet and improving earnings outlook. By contrast, BigBear.ai is growing much more slowly (even shrinking in the near term) and is grappling with larger immediate losses and external uncertainties. While BigBear’s low relative valuation, big-name partnerships, and hefty backlog show promise for the long run, those factors may take longer to translate into stock gains, given the execution risks. The current Zacks Ranks underscore this divergence: SoundHound carries a Rank #3 (Hold), whereas BigBear.ai sits at Rank #4 (Sell).
You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).
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