Greetings from Zoom Town, USA!

You see, I could've written this email to you from Lake Tahoe, San Diego, or from my Silicon Valley home office.

I often do Zoom video calls with my research team and then create these pieces for you from the road – in fact, I've worked remotely for the past 25 years or so.

I don't think I could return to a physical office. And a recent study by online recruiter Zippia reveals that, in the post-COVID world, I'm not alone.

Just fifty-six percent of workers are comfortable returning to the office. But – and this is crucial – 68% said they prefer working remotely, or at least on a hybrid schedule.

And 64% said they'd consider quitting if forced to return to the office full-time.

What do these views on remote work tell me? That there's money to be made from this trend...

The Results are In

In another recent survey posted in Forbes, respondents' answers revealed why they enjoy working remotely. According to the people:

• 34% of office workers said that interruptions from colleagues affect their productivity, compared to just 16% of remote workers.
• 25% of office workers said that office politics distracts from their workflow, compared to just 15% of remote workers.
• And 28% of office workers said their daily commute negatively impacts their productivity.

Furthermore, according to data-security firm Kastle Systems, the office-occupancy rate in 10 major U.S. cities remained below 50% for much of 2022, a time when workers were supposed to be heading back to their offices.

It's statistics like these that encourage me to stay away from investing in commercial real estate. Meanwhile, I'm focusing on the nearly $800 billion cloud-computing sector...

"Zoom Towns" Become Popular

You see, the cloud-computing sector provides the infrastructure for remote and hybrid work. At the height of the pandemic, more than 300 million video chats took place every day.

Even today, many companies are replacing in-person meetings with ones held on communication platforms like Zoom (ZOOM) – hence my earlier reference to "Zoom Town, USA."

In fact, the whole subject of "Zoom towns" came up recently while I was visiting my youngest daughter in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Her friend's dad was telling me how his business associates have had to start offering remote work for at least a few days a week to attract tech-savvy young people.

Meanwhile, my other daughter has two master's degrees and now works remotely full-time from her apartment in San Diego. And my former next-door neighbor left behind a high-tech job in California to buy a home in rural Pennsylvania...

An area where the cost of living is much cheaper, and he can still complete all his assigned duties. (By the way, he texted me recently to say he couldn't be happier.)

While I very much believe in Zoom, the company's stock is out of favor following a massive run during the pandemic.

So, in a case like this, we're looking for an aggressive cloud-computing company that has a hook in employee communications and productivity. And I've found one...

Targeting Two Trends in One

This company offers technology that creates a collaboration hub. It enables internal messaging that teams can use without the need to send text messages through smartphones or other devices.

Some 65 of the companies in the Fortune 100 are already using this company's system. And in 2020, the last full year of data, this company's communications platform alone had sales of $630 million.

This company is a great hybrid-tech investment. What I mean is that it exposes us to two key investment areas: remote/hybrid work, and the massive cloud-computing trend.

According to Fortune Business Insights, the cloud-computing sector is growing by nearly 18% a year. By 2028, it'll be worth nearly $800 billion, and it's on pace to double as soon as five years after that!

Simply put, there's a lot of upside here.

This company's core product is a cloud-based case- and task-management platform that stores and updates all the important information about a client's customers.

It includes automatic rules related to when a customer or a case gets escalated to another team, perhaps because they're having a problem with a product.

Of course, this company has gone far beyond its origins in providing software via the Internet. Today, it's pushing the boundaries of Artificial Intelligence, "big data," the blockchain, and online workplace collaboration.

"Winner" Written All Over It

This company has "winner" written all over it. Over the past three years, it's posted average per-share earnings gains of 15%.

And that figure is about to accelerate. Analysts project the company will achieve profit growth of almost 199% for the full year.

Even if we trim that projection back by 75%, we could still see this company's earnings double in less than two years.

Bottom line: this is a great opportunity to cash in on the increasingly permanent way to work. And if you're a "Pro" subscriber, I'll reveal all the details!

Cheers and Good Investing,

Chief Investment Officer
Trend Trader Daily

Tags: work-from-home zoom