Is the business good?
How good a business is CIEN?
Ciena earns 13% on the capital it employs against a 9.0% cost of capital, so the business is worth more the bigger it gets.
13%
Return on invested capital · cost of capital 9.0% · 3.5 points above what the capital costs: growth creates value
- Operating margin
- 9.2%
Operating margin · Communication Equipment median 4.4% · 12 months to Q2 2026
- Cash conversion
- 1.90×
Cash conversion · 2.79× a year ago · every dollar of reported profit arrived as cash, and more
- Share count, year on year
- +0.93%
Share count, year on year · flat: no meaningful dilution
| Year | Operating margin |
|---|---|
| FY2020 | 14% |
| FY2021 | 14% |
| FY2022 | 6.1% |
| FY2023 | 8.2% |
| FY2024 | 4.2% |
| FY2025 | 4.1% |
Details›
- Gross margin12 months to Q2 2026
- 43%
- Operating margin12 months to Q2 2026
- 9.2%
- Net margin12 months to Q2 2026
- 7.9%
- Free cash flow margin
- 15%
- R&D as % of revenue
- 16%
- Revenue, trailing twelve months
- $5.57B
- Free cash flow, trailing twelve months
- $833M
- Net income, trailing twelve months
- $438M
- Return on invested capitaloperating profit after tax ÷ debt + equity − cash
- 13%
Margins, capital and share counts from the statements as filed with the SEC; cash conversion from the cash flow statement.
Communication Equipment
Ranks #17 of 21 by Smart Score