The continued spread of the coronavirus has proven problematic for many companies, particularly if they rely on China for supplies, customers, or both. Not every name has been disadvantaged by the disease, though. Zoom Video Communications (ZM 1.57%), for example, may have already added more users this year than it did during all of 2019.
That's the conclusion from Bernstein analyst Zane Chrane anyway, who estimates the video conferencing service provider added 2.22 million users in just the first couple of months of 2020 versus the 1.99 million users added over the course of last year. Zoom doesn't offer information regarding the size or habits of its customer base, but if Chrane's assumption of 2.22 million new users is on target, the organization provides video conferencing service for 12.92 million people at least once per month.
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One reason more workers may be opting for a video communication service in lieu of face-to-face interaction? Germs.
This year's coronavirus epidemic is not just communicable from one person to another, but has proven to be more contagious than initially expected. China's health minister Ma Xiaowei believes the virus may have also already mutated into a form that's even easier to spread than the disease was at the onset of its outbreak in Wuhan, capital of China's Hubei province. Government officials forced the shutdown of some businesses in China, while others did so voluntarily. Zoom Video Communications' technology provides those displaced employees a means of communicating while they are unable to come into a place of work.
Zoom shares are up 57% since the beginning of 2020, around the time the coronavirus began to spread in earnest.
