C3.ai and Palantir: Who Wins the Battle of Enterprise AI Stocks Now?

Core Insights - Enterprise AI is transitioning from hype to execution, with C3.ai and Palantir at the forefront, focusing on turning large datasets into actionable decisions, but their monetization strategies differ significantly [1] C3.ai Overview - C3.ai is a pure-play enterprise AI platform with prebuilt applications aimed at accelerating adoption across various industries, showing improved commercial momentum with a notable increase in bookings during Q2 fiscal 2026 [2][5] - The federal segment has been a strong growth area, with significant year-over-year increases in bookings from defense, aerospace, and civilian agencies, benefiting from a shift towards commercial off-the-shelf AI solutions [3] - C3.ai's partnerships with Microsoft, AWS, and system integrators are yielding results, with most bookings now sourced through these partners, and the introduction of agentic process automation expands its market reach [4] - Despite improved execution, C3.ai is still facing substantial losses and negative free cash flow, with management acknowledging compressed gross margins due to initial production deployments and ongoing investments [5] Palantir Overview - Palantir is showcasing true enterprise AI adoption at scale, achieving over 60% revenue growth in Q3 2025, with U.S. commercial sales more than doubling, indicating successful conversion of demand into large contracts [6][9] - The company's Artificial Intelligence Platform (AIP) is positioned as production-grade AI, facilitating broad deployments and faster deal cycles, which enhances customer integration and raises switching costs [7][8] - Palantir has achieved high profitability with operating margins exceeding 50% and record free cash flow, leading to a Rule of 40 score above 100, indicating sustainable demand momentum [9] Price Performance - C3.ai's stock has decreased by 39.5% over the past six months, while Palantir's shares have increased by 35.5% in the same period [10] Valuation - C3.ai is trading at a forward price-to-sales (P/S) ratio of 6.4X, below its three-year median of 8.37X, indicating a deep discount compared to sector averages and Palantir, which has a forward P/S ratio of 74.69X, above its three-year median of 19.69X [14] Earnings Projections - The consensus estimate for C3.ai's fiscal 2026 loss per share has narrowed to $1.21, while for fiscal 2027, it has narrowed to $1.00 [18] - In contrast, Palantir's earnings per share estimate for 2025 has increased to 73 cents, and for 2026, it has risen to $1.04 [20] Conclusion - Palantir is positioned as the stronger near-term investment, demonstrating effective enterprise AI demand translation into scalable deployments and profitability, while C3.ai shows signs of recovery but remains a hold until consistent profitability is achieved [21][22]