Money Map Report editor Horacio Marquez says Garmin is an attractive buy at its current price of $34.46. The company is aggressively improving product technology and extending the services it offers to customers. It should also receive a boost from Christmas shopping.

Horacio says Garmin’s high-growth potential combined with its value share price is too much of a bargain to ignore…

This from Money Morning:

Garmin, a leading producer of global-positioning systems, has a strong market position, meaning its stock should deliver nice profits if purchased at the current low valuation.

Global-positioning system technology has revolutionized navigation at sea, in the air, and on land. And with my Garmin unit, you know exactly where you are at sea or on land. By watching your progress as it’s tracked on the GPS map display, you always know your location.

Advanced features allow you to follow the fastest, direct and alternative routes around congestion, as you see fit. And the systems take into account historical and increasingly real-time traffic information on land, and also tell you about hotels, gas stations, ATMs and other nearby points of interest.

As GPS sales exploded in recent years, Garmin saw its stock price soar by nearly 500%. But the field has become much more crowded. While Garmin took the early lead and has a market share of more than 50%, rivals are gaining.

Last year, the Amsterdam-based TomTom NV made a splash with its own devices, which permitted the user to enter a destination address by voice – and which featured a lower selling price. This year Garmin has leapfrogged again, this time by rivaling offerings featuring more-accurate and more-versatile voice-recognition capabilities.

Clearly, the technological leapfrogging, like voice-recognition technology and real-time traffic data is creating more market-share volatility, even as market saturation and increased competition is bringing the prices down. To make matters worse, mobile phones – such as the Apple Inc. (Nasdaq:AAPL) iPhone, and others made by such firms as Nokia Corp. (ADR:NOK) - are adding land-navigation capabilities. This has forced Garmin to strike back by entering the mobile phone market. This proposition is easier said than done, since penetrating this ultra-competitive market is extremely difficult and the rivals in the mobile-phone sector are goliaths.

In this environment, predicting a technological winner is difficult. And it is easy to see that profit margins and sales growth rates by manufacturer are going to keep getting compressed by endless competition.

Already we have seen Garmin miss reduced earnings estimates in the last quarter. And Nokia’s $8.1 billion purchase of U.S. digital-mapping king Navteq Corp. (NYSE:NVT) highlights the rising competition. But Garmin isn’t rolling over and will not let its lead go without a fight. It first tried to acquire a digital-mapping company of its own. When that failed – in Garmin’s typical aggressive fashion – it refused to give up and resorted to a well-thought-out Plan B.

Garmin locked up a long-term deal with Navteq – despite the sale. Then it signed up for the mapping firm’s real-time traffic services. And it continues to consider other services to offer customers – hoping to improve both its margins and its overall profitability.

While the long-term situation in electronics is always one of flux and needs to be monitored closely, the reality is that Garmin’s shares have taken a dramatic beating, plunging 73% from their all-time high of $125.68. Garmin shares closed Friday at $34.46, up 82 cents, or 2.44%.

With a current Price/Earnings Ratio of 8.3, a forward P/E of 9.7 and a Price/Earnings to Grow Rate (PEG) ratio of about 0.5 – and with the Christmas shopping season looming – Garmin is now a value stock with strong growth to come.

The current “doomsday-scenario” pricing sets an absurdly low bar for an industry leader to jump over, meaning the stock represents a solid – if not downright attractive – value at these levels.

Now featuring the top voice-recognition technology, and adding other important features and services, Garmin is demonstrating a bare-fisted response to competitive changes has underscored a willingness to defense its market leadership. Buy this high-tech growth stock at a value-stock valuation.

Action to Take: Buy Garmin for its GPS-market leadership. At current levels, you’re buying a high-growth stock at low-growth, value-stock valuations. It’s too much of a bargain to ignore.

Source: Buy, Sell or Hold: Garmin Ltd.

Immersion develops haptic technologies that allow people to use touch to operate digital devices. Think the type of fancy touch-screen technology used by the much-hyped iPhone.

Paul says Immersion remains loaded with potential but remains still somewhat on the launchpad. But with three major set to toss the firm new business, Paul is bullish…

While Immersion has met its financial expectations, the mass adoption curve for its technology has been pushed out and has overlapped a point in time where high beta stocks have been stripped of premium valuations.

That said, we believe the underlying fundamentals remain intact and the stock is attractive here.

In case you don’t know about Immersion’s industry, the company is a market leader in the field of haptics – a technology that simplifies and enhances human interaction with everyday technology. The company holds hundreds of patents and provides products and patent licensing to some of the world’s biggest firms.

We’ve already seen the first wave of enthusiasm, as Immersion’s technology is incorporated in cutting-edge consumer electronics products like cellphones (Immersion’s patented VibTonz software is already in Nokia (NYSE: NOK), Samsung, and Motorola (NYSE: MOT) handsets) and Sony (NYSE:SNE) PlayStation video games.

However, the company’s smaller segments (mobility, gaming, and automotive) are enjoying faster growth at the moment and offer the most opportunity. And as this technology matures, it will filter into products with lower price points that have mass appeal. At that point, IMMR’s top line will have the potential to grow exponentially in line with unit shipments.

Medical Division Set To Spring Back To Life, While Other Segments Rise Rapidly

While the consumer products receive most of the attention, the bulk of Immersion’s revenue actually comes from medical training devices that help surgeons learn their craft.

That core business has slowed in the US recently, but a push to expand in Europe and Asia is likely to reaccelerate revenues from this segment later this year. And even as its Medical division has slowed, Immersion has managed to offset that through rapid growth in newer areas.

For example, strength in the Mobility (NADAQ:USMO) division saw sales shoot up by ten times during the most recent quarter and now accounts for 13% of revenues. And looking ahead to the remainder of 2008, there is plenty to be excited about…

The Buyer’s Favorite Word

Right off the bat, three major industries are set to toss more business Immersion’s way:

1. Auto: BMW (FRA:BMW) is expanding the use of iDrive into its 3-series models.
2. Telecom: Samsung and LG are shipping handsets that leverage haptics and Nokia is expected to follow later this year.
3. Gaming: 3M (NYSE:MMM) is producing casino gaming screens, which could offer upside over the second half of 2008.

That’s the business end. But what about the stock’s valuation?

In a word: Cheap.

While the concept of buying low and selling high is a mainstay of investing, every now and again, this simple concept temporarily eludes investors.

That explains why Immersion trades for less than two times its net cash. In the software industry, buying a profitable company at that price is relatively unheard of. But at a time when fear is rampant, you occasionally get the opportunity to snag a bargain.

In Immersion’s case, it boasts $4.52 in net cash per share. This is in cash equivalents that could be quickly liquidated if a majority holder were to buy the company.

This basically means that if a third party such as Sony or Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) or Oracle (NASDAQ:ORCL) were to buy the company, it would be getting the operating business and patent portfolio for $2.30 per share (assuming a $6.82 share price). When stocks get to these levels, it becomes cheaper for a partner to acquire the firm than pay royalties for the licenses.

The Big Boys Bailed Out… But Are Now Getting Back In

Unless you took a vacation from the planet over the first three months of the year, you’ll probably know that it represented the worst start to the year for the stock market, as gridlock in the credit markets plunged financial institutions into dire straits.

That goes some way to explaining the unusual selling pressure that Immersion endured during the first quarter.

For example, Immersion’s largest holder, Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS), all but liquidated its position over that period. Goldman sold 78% of its 3.1 million share position and if you assume that the firm sold those evenly throughout the quarter (a measured program of selling, rather than panic), it accounted for 5% of the daily volume each day. This represents a significant hurdle for a stock to overcome in a stable market, let alone a panic situation.

Since then, however, big institutions have ramped up their buying of Immersion shares. Two large shareholders have stepped up big-time, with Balyasny beefing up the size of its position by 131%, while Immersion’s largest current shareholder, Mazama, has bought 23% more stock.

This represents a strong vote of confidence from institutions that are intimate with Immersion’s story and have combined to own 15% of the shares outstanding.

Here’s The Skinny On Immersion’s Plan To Fatten Up

To sum up, Immersion has its finger on several different developing markets that have the ability to dramatically increase its growth. If one of them catches fire, investors will benefit from accelerating profit growth and multiple expansion. Additionally, Immersion remains a buyout candidate for the likes of Sony or Samsung and a precedent was set earlier this year when Nokia acquired Navteq (NYSE:NVT).

The downside scenario would be if Immersion’s share price stagnates at current levels. That could happen if increasing pressure on consumer spending delays the adoption of devices using haptics. However, the low valuation would likely still provide support for the stock and you’d merely sacrifice opportunity, which is much better than sacrificing investment capital.

Source: Immersion Is ‘Force-Feeding’ Its Way Towards Solid Growth