Is GoPro finally hitting its stride after years of struggles? This week’s Emmy win and recently introduced AI initiatives suggest the camera maker is getting its groove back.
GoPro (GPRO -0.79%) investors are having a great week. In the pre-market hours of Friday morning, the camera maker’s stock was up 22.7% since last Friday’s closing bell, according to data from S&P Global Market Intelligence.
The catalyst made headlines, for sure.
Image source: Getty Images.
The tech behind GoPro’s Emmy-winning feature
GoPro scored a technical 2025 Emmy Award for its image-stitching 360-degree video features.
The award announcement highlighted the way GoPro delivers seamless panoramic video in real time. It’s one thing to put these immersive environments together with high-powered equipment and lots of rendering time in the studio, and a much more impressive feat to make it happen in a livestream or podcast, using nothing more than the camera and GoPro’s cloud-based streaming services.
More than just an Emmy in GoPro’s recent trophy case
The image-boosting Emmy Award was won in the middle of a little golden age for GoPro. The company recently posted robust second-quarter results, and there are artificial intelligence (AI) ingredients in its current recipe for long-term success.
One of GoPro’s big jumps in August was inspired by a data-licensing program that makes some imagery available for training AI systems. Users of GoPro’s online video storage services can make a little bit of money by allowing their videos to support AI-training practices.
It’s an opt-in program with 125,000 hours of video material committed to the licensing opportunity as of Aug. 26, which is a veritable drop in the bucket — the GoPro video-storage cloud holds 13 million hours of content. Then again, the so-called AI Training Program is really new, leaving less than a month between the July launch and August’s activity update.
The company is walking a fine line between pleasing investors and satisfying camera customers here. Automatic AI-training sales would scare off a great number of GoPro users who insist on strict data integrity. With the opt-in model, each user gets to decide where they fall on the spectrum of moneymaking opportunity and privacy-guarding AI controls.
GoPro is capitalizing on this collection of bullish events. Management filed some paperwork on Aug. 26 to prepare for a stock sale. On Sept. 12, GoPro issued 11.1 million new shares via warrants to two creditor groups. GoPro’s balance sheet shows zero long-term debt and management wants to keep it that way. Under these circumstances, roughly $29 million of share-sale cash comes in handy because the company’s cash reserves are running low.
Anders Bylund has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.