Blackberry Wins $815 Million in Court, Prompting Stock Price Surge

Jennifer van der Kleut

Blackberry’s (BBRY) 10.6-percent stock price surge this week prevented the Driverless Transportation Weekly Stock Index (D20) from losing more than the Dow or S&P 500.

With 13 price losers and only seven price gainers, the D20 lost 0.8 percent, or 1.43 points, to close at 184.48. It was slightly better than the Dow, which lost 1 percent and the S&P 500, which lost 1.1 percent.

Blackberry was awarded $815 million in a royalty payments dispute with chip maker Qualcomm, which should help build Blackberry’s war chest as it make its transition from a mobile handset-focused hardware company to a software company.

On March 31, Blackberry announced earnings that beat industry analyst’s predictions, and many are beginning to believe that the company’s transition to software will be successful.

Blackberry’s stock price advanced $0.83 this week to close at $8.64, its highest level since December of 2015.

Visit the Driverless Transportation D20 Stock Index page to learn more about it and its component stocks.

Up-and-Comers:

Luminar Technologies, Inc. announced that they raised $36 million in seed funding as they debuted their built-from-scratch LiDAR sensor package. The Portola Valley, California company has focused its efforts on building a LiDAR system that is higher-performing than the competition. By using their own designed chips, lasers and receivers they predict they will be able to “see” further and with more detail than competitors’ systems.

Peloton Technology announced that it raised $60 million in Series B funding. Peloton creates hardware and software systems that allow commercial-sized trucks to safely platoon while driving, increasing the fuel economy for all the trucks involved.