Will BigBear.ai Emerge as a Top Small-Cap AI Turnaround Story?

BigBear.ai Holdings, Inc. BBAI is increasingly being viewed as a potential small-cap AI turnaround as it reshapes its business around higher-value, mission-critical applications and strengthens its balance sheet. While near-term financials remain pressured, recent strategic moves suggest a clearer path toward sustainable growth.

In the third quarter of 2025, BigBear.ai reported revenues of $33.1 million, reflecting program timing issues in certain U.S. Army contracts, but the backlog remained solid at $376 million, providing multi-year revenue visibility. Importantly, the company ended the quarter with a record cash balance of $456.6 million, dramatically improving financial flexibility and reducing near-term liquidity risk.

The most consequential development is BigBear.ai’s definitive agreement to acquire Ask Sage, a secure, model-agnostic generative AI platform already deployed across 16,000 government teams. Ask Sage is expected to generate roughly $25 million in ARR in 2025, representing a sixfold year-over-year increase, and positions BigBear.ai squarely in the fast-growing market for agentic AI in regulated defense and intelligence environments. Management views this acquisition as a catalyst for margin expansion and cross-selling across defense, homeland security and travel-and-trade use cases.

Beyond M&A, BigBear.ai is expanding internationally, opening a UAE office and signing strategic partnerships across border security and aerospace infrastructure, signaling ambitions beyond its traditional U.S. federal base.

While execution risk remains — particularly around integration and profitability — the combination of a fortified balance sheet, accelerating AI platform adoption and deep national-security positioning gives BigBear.ai credible upside as a speculative AI turnaround story.

BigBear.ai’s Competitive Landscape

In assessing whether BigBear.ai can become a top small-cap AI turnaround, two notable competitors are Palantir Technologies PLTR and C3.ai AI.

Palantir Technologies is a leader in AI-driven analytics for government and enterprise. Palantir’s strength in data fusion and operational AI gives it a competitive edge in national security and large commercial deployments. Palantir’s established customer base and recurring revenue model set a high bar BigBear.ai aims to climb.

C3.ai focuses on enterprise AI software across sectors like energy, manufacturing and defense. C3.ai’s broad platform and multiple industry use cases contrast with BigBear.ai’s more defense-centered positioning. C3.ai’s existing suite and partnerships have driven scale in ways BigBear.ai’s narrower focus has yet to match.

Both Palantir and C3.ai demonstrate how diversified AI platforms with robust enterprise traction can command valuation premiums. For BigBear.ai to emerge as a turnaround, it must translate its defense AI momentum into sustainable ARR expansion comparable to these peers.

BBAI Stock’s Price Performance & Valuation Trend

BigBear.ai stock has surged 96.3% over the past year and outperformed major benchmarks, the Zacks Computer and Technology sector, and even the Zacks Computers – IT Services industry, as shown below.

BBAI Stock’s One-Year Performance

BBAI stock is currently trading at a premium compared with the industry peers, with a forward 12-month price-to-sales (P/S) ratio of 15.89, as evidenced by the chart below.

BBAI’s P/S Ratio (Forward 12-Month) vs. Industry

EPS Trend of BBAI Stock

Over the past 60 days, expectations for the company’s 2025 loss per share narrowed from $1.10 to 93 cents, while the anticipated 2026 loss per share also narrowed from 32 cents to 25 cents. The company had previously posted a loss of $1.10 in 2024, making the projected trajectory one of steady improvement rather than abrupt transformation.
 

BigBear.ai stock currently carries 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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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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