Motorola Solutions (MSI)
Forward P/E is 26.38x against a peer median of 34.25x, a ratio of 0.77x, with a trailing P/E of 37.67x. Latest-quarter revenue growth was +13.3% year over year (PRIMARY/EDGAR) — positive and not collapsing, though below the cluster median of +27.3%. The discount is relative rather than absolute: 26.38x is not a low multiple in itself, and the PEG ratio of 2.53 shows the price is high relative to expected earnings growth, so the label rests on the peer gap plus steady delivered growth, not on the shares being cheap in isolation. Delivered demand check: the cluster's median revenue growth was +27.3% year over year — demand rising.
What would change this label: Move to FAIRLY PRICED if the forward P/E rises above about 30.8x (0.90x the current peer median of 34.25x) at unchanged growth, or if revenue growth falls below +5% year over year. Move to OVERVALUED if the forward P/E expands above about 39.4x (1.15x the peer median) while the PEG stays above 2.5.
Motorola Solutions sells the radios, cameras and software that police, fire and other emergency services use to communicate. Sales grew about 13% over the past year, and its shares cost about 26 times expected profits versus about 34 times for the communications companies it is grouped with. That is still not a low price in absolute terms, but it is cheaper than its group while growing steadily, so it reads as undervalued on a relative basis.
Both lines start at 100 on 2020-09-01. Over the full window Motorola Solutions returned +214.50% and the S&P 500 +118.28% (price returns; dividends not reinvested). Worst peak-to-trough fall for Motorola Solutions: -27.9% (2024-11-08 to 2025-12-16). Source: Nasdaq official daily history.
What the label rests on
Forward P/E is 26.38x against a peer median of 34.25x, a ratio of 0.77x, with a trailing P/E of 37.67x. Latest-quarter revenue growth was +13.3% year over year (PRIMARY/EDGAR) — positive and not collapsing, though below the cluster median of +27.3%. The discount is relative rather than absolute: 26.38x is not a low multiple in itself, and the PEG ratio of 2.53 shows the price is high relative to expected earnings growth, so the label rests on the peer gap plus steady delivered growth, not on the shares being cheap in isolation. Delivered demand check: the cluster's median revenue growth was +27.3% year over year — demand rising. The company’s forward P/E is 26.4× against a peer median of 34.2×. Its own history: UNVERIFIED — no sourced range available. Sector demand read: Delivered demand check: the Communications equipment group's median latest-quarter revenue growth was +27.3% year over year (SEC filings) — demand rising. Latest-quarter sales growth was +13.3% versus a year earlier (SEC filings).
| Company | Price (Oct 28, 2026) | Forward P/E | Trailing P/E |
|---|---|---|---|
| Motorola Solutions (MSI) | $478.38 | 26.4× | 37.7× |
| LITE | $878.00 | 39.7× | — |
| CIEN | $356.35 | 34.2× | 79.6× |
| FFIV | $398.49 | 21.9× | 31.8× |
| ANET | $188.16 | 40.3× | 59.5× |
| CSCO | $110.73 | 21.5× | 33.2× |
| Peer median | 34.2× |
Multiples: stockanalysis.com (SECONDARY, S&P Global data), fetched Oct 28, 2026. Peer set chosen by sector; the median is the middle value of the set. The label and its numbers were recorded in the programme’s label registry on Oct 28, 2026 and will be scored at 6 and 12 months.
Sales, profit and cash
Gross margin = gross profit divided by sales, from SEC filings.
Free cash flow = cash from operations minus spending on plant and equipment, both from the company’s SEC cash-flow statement. Gaps are quarters where that spending line is not separately tagged in the filings — shown as gaps, never estimated.
| Quarter | Sales | Gross margin | Net income | EPS (GAAP, diluted) | Free cash flow |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q/E Jul 2026 2026-07-04 | $3.1B | 53.6% | $557M | 3.33 | $414M |
| Q/E Apr 2026 2026-04-04 | $2.7B | 50.2% | $366M | 2.18 | $389M |
| Q/E Dec 2025 2025-12-31 | $3.4B | 52.3% | $649M | — | $1.1B |
| Q/E Sep 2025 2025-09-27 | $3.0B | 51.6% | $562M | 3.33 | $732M |
| Q/E Jun 2025 2025-06-28 | $2.8B | 51.1% | $513M | 3.04 | $225M |
| Q/E Mar 2025 2025-03-29 | $2.5B | 51.4% | $430M | 2.53 | $473M |
| Q/E Dec 2024 2024-12-31 | $3.0B | 51.4% | $611M | — | $984M |
| Q/E Sep 2024 2024-09-28 | $2.8B | 51.4% | $562M | 3.29 | $702M |
| Q/E Jun 2024 2024-06-29 | $2.6B | 51.0% | $443M | 2.60 | $112M |
| Q/E Mar 2024 2024-03-30 | $2.4B | 49.9% | $-39M | -0.23 | $336M |
| Q/E Dec 2023 2023-12-31 | $2.8B | 51.1% | $596M | — | $1.2B |
| Q/E Sep 2023 2023-09-30 | $2.6B | 50.1% | $464M | 2.70 | $649M |
The last twelve reported quarters. Full 24-quarter history sits in the data pack behind this page. A dash means the figure is not tagged as a standalone quarter in the company’s SEC facts (the usual case is the fourth quarter, which many companies only report inside the full-year filing) — it is missing, not zero.
Earnings: getting better or worse?
Each box is one quarter’s earnings per share (EPS). Green means EPS was higher than the same quarter a year earlier; red means lower; a dash means the figure is not tagged in the filings.
Basis: GAAP diluted EPS from SEC company facts, compared with the same quarter a year earlier.
Key facts
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| Company (legal name in filings) | Motorola Solutions, Inc. |
| Chief executive | Greg Brown (source: https://www.motorolasolutions.com/investors/corporate-governance/greg-brown.html) |
| Sector | Technology — Communications Equipment — sells land mobile radio systems, body cameras and command-centre software for public safety and enterprises |
| Share price (Oct 28, 2026) | $478.38 |
| Market value (market cap) | $80.0B — share price times shares outstanding of 165,493,788 (SEC filings; SEC EDGAR dei EntityCommonStockSharesOutstanding (latest)) |
| Sales, last twelve months | $12.2B |
| Net income, last twelve months | $2.1B |
| Free cash flow, last twelve months | $2.7B |
| Latest reported quarter | Q/E Jul 2026 (of 24 quarters in the data pack) |
| Six-year price return vs S&P 500 | +214.50% vs +118.28% |
| Worst peak-to-trough fall | -27.9% (2024-11-08 to 2025-12-16) |
What we could not verify
- TTM GAAP diluted EPS could not be summed from company facts because at least one of the last four quarters (typically Q4) has no standalone tagged EPS; trailing P/E is therefore taken from the labelled secondary source in valuation_label.md.
- Own-history P/E range not yet compiled for this company in the Phase 1 batch run; the label rests on peer-median, growth and PEG evidence.
- Peer set in the brief mixes faster-growing networking and optical names (ANET 40.3x, LITE 39.74x forward P/E) with slower ones (CSCO 21.52x), so the peer median of 34.25x is a broad communications benchmark; Motorola Solutions' own business is public-safety communications, which is not directly comparable to all five peers.
- Guidance record (each quarter scored against the guidance the company gave the quarter before) is not yet compiled for this company — it is a Phase 2 layer. The earnings strip below therefore uses reported EPS versus a year earlier, which is fully sourced from filings.
The IT factor — the most exciting thing the market is overlooking — is not assessed on an X-Ray page. It belongs to the Deep Dive (Phase 2), where it gets the evidence standard it needs. Leadership-era scoring (the six years split by chief executive) is likewise a Phase 2 layer; this page names the current chief executive only, from a sourced profile.
Sources
- SEC EDGAR submissions — Filing index; company legal name.
https://data.sec.gov/submissions/CIK0000068505.json - SEC EDGAR company facts — Quarterly financial spine: revenue, gross profit, net income, GAAP diluted EPS, operating cash flow, PP&E capex, buybacks, dividends, diluted shares.
https://data.sec.gov/api/xbrl/companyfacts/CIK0000068505.json - Nasdaq official daily history — Daily closes for the company; SPY (assetclass=etf) saved as raw/nasdaq_spy_raw.json over identical dates.
https://api.nasdaq.com/api/quote/MSI/historical?assetclass=stocks - Valuation multiples and peer figures — stockanalysis.com (SECONDARY, S&P Global data), fetched Oct 28, 2026; see valuation_label.md in the data pack.
Conventions: earliest-filed value per period, as first reported; cash-flow years-to-date differenced quarter by quarter; EPS never differenced; free cash flow = operating cash flow minus plant-and-equipment spending. This page is a dated snapshot — updates are new versions, never silent edits.