Alamar Biosciences (ALMR) Q3 2026 earnings review
Alamar Biosciences lifts its sales outlook, but operating losses double
Alamar Biosciences is selling far more protein-detection kits and lab machines while its overhead costs widen its losses. The proteomics company grew third-quarter revenue 68% to $33.5 million, well above what its own plan pointed to, and lifted gross margin past 61%. Chief executive Yuling Luo said drug makers accounted for the largest share of sales for the first time, aided by big study wins with UK Biobank and GSK, and raised the full-year outlook.
| Revenue | $33.5M +68% from a year ago |
|---|---|
| Consumables revenue | $17.8M +79% from a year ago |
| Gross margin | 61.5% 59.7% a year ago |
| Full-year revenue outlook | Raised $4M middle of the range: 64% growth |
⚖️ Verdict: 🟢 Bullish
The story got better because machine sales sped back up and commercial drug makers replaced grant-dependent universities as the top customer group. Beating the third-quarter sales target shows the initial plan was cautious, though by our math the new full-year outlook still leaves fourth-quarter sales slightly below the third quarter. The bad news: overhead spending jumped 81%, almost doubling the operating loss to $15 million.
The question now is whether the fourth-quarter slowdown in the full-year plan is another cautious target or a real dip as large custom projects wrap up. If new study wins ramp quickly, fourth-quarter sales will rise from the third quarter; if project timing is lumpy, growth will halve from the current pace. Fourth-quarter revenue and the year-end count of installed machines will tell.
🐂 Bull Case
Drug Makers Now Drive Over Half of Sales
Alamar makes lab machines and chemical kits that detect disease proteins in tiny blood samples. Academic labs once bought over half its output, leaving sales exposed to government grant budgets. Chief executive Yuling Luo said that changed this quarter, with "biopharma customers accounting for the largest portion of our revenue for the first time".
The company also won two huge population studies for NULISA, its technology for measuring rare proteins. "Our selection by UK Biobank and new collaboration with GSK show that leading institutions and drug developers are choosing NULISA to reach the low-abundance proteome at scale," Luo said.
- UK Biobank study: 80,000 samples for Parkinson's and Alzheimer's research
- GSK collaboration: 60,000 samples across five disease areas
- Services revenue: $7.2 million, up 69% from a year ago and up 18% from last quarter
This shift matters because drug makers have deeper budgets than grant-funded universities. Services revenue rose 18% from last quarter even though management had warned that custom test projects would cool off.
What to watch: the customer breakdown in the upcoming quarterly filing. It will show whether one single drug maker accounted for more than 10% of revenue again.
Test Kit Demand Lifted Gross Margin Past 61%
Alamar sells its ARGO lab machines and then sells recurring chemical kits, called consumables, for every blood test run on them. Because test kits carry higher profit margins than hardware, gross margin rises when kit sales grow faster than machine sales.
Consumables revenue jumped 79% from a year ago to $17.8 million on "strong demand for multiplex panels", which are kits that test for hundreds of proteins at once. That kept consumables above 53% of total sales and lifted gross margin to 61.5%, up 1.8 percentage points from a year ago. Alamar also credited lower hardware costs and higher kit prices, beating its own mid-to-high 50s percentage target.
What to watch: fourth-quarter gross margin on the year-end report. Holding above 60% would show factory scale is overcoming the cost of adding new capacity.
Machine Sales Sped Up and Beat the Plan
Hardware growth had slowed from 78% in the first quarter to 35% in the second, raising doubts about how fast labs were buying ARGO machines. Management also set a cautious third-quarter plan calling for total sales to rise only a few percent from the second quarter.
Both worries eased this quarter. Instrument revenue grew 50% from a year ago to $8.5 million on "continued growth in new instrument placements". Total sales rose 14% from last quarter to $33.5 million, beating the middle of the company's plan by 11% by our math, and Alamar raised its full-year outlook.
What to watch: the year-end installed base count on the fourth-quarter call. Reaching 202 total machines would confirm Alamar met its goal of adding at least 100 systems this year.
🐻 Bear Case
Overhead Costs Pushed the Operating Loss Deeper
Rapid revenue growth and a 61.5% gross margin are not bringing Alamar closer to breaking even. The proteomics company is spending heavily to expand its staff and pay for life as a newly public company.
Operating expenses rose 81% from a year ago to $35.8 million on "planned investments in headcount, infrastructure and R&D supplies as well as incremental public company costs". Selling and administrative overhead jumped by 10.4 percentage points of revenue to 58.5%, while research spending fell by 3.1 percentage points to 48.2%. That pushed the operating loss to $15.1 million, almost double the $7.9 million loss a year ago.
What to watch: operating expense growth against revenue growth in the fourth quarter. Another quarter where overhead grows faster than sales would deepen the cash burn.
New Outlook Still Points to a Fourth-Quarter Slowdown
Alamar beat its third-quarter target by about $3.4 million by our math and lifted its full-year revenue outlook by $4 million at the middle of the range, to $121–123 million. Because the full-year raise barely exceeds the third-quarter beat, the company scarcely raised its view for the fourth quarter.
By our math, the new outlook leaves about $33.0 million of revenue for the fourth quarter. That would be down nearly 2% from the third quarter and up about 31% from a year ago, less than half the 68% pace just reported. Management previously noted that last year's fourth quarter included two large study orders.
What to watch: fourth-quarter revenue against the $33.0 million implied figure. A second large beat would show management sets conservative targets rather than facing a real demand slowdown.
Risks this quarter didn't answer
Four standing items in our analysis had no new reading in the third-quarter earnings release.
- Olink patent lawsuit: no update in the release on the federal court case or appeal; the quarterly filing's legal note will carry the latest status.
- Installed base and kit spending per machine: management updates both metrics only once a year on the fourth-quarter call.
- Clinical machine timeline: no update on the ARGO HT System DX, its planned hospital diagnostic system targeted for a 2027 regulatory filing, which supports the long-term growth case but carries execution risk.
- Rival test panels: no data on competitive win rates against larger rivals in brain and immune disease studies.
👓 Other Themes
President Tod White Will Retire at Year-End
President Tod White will retire at the end of 2026 and stay on as an advisor through June 2027. White joined Alamar in 2021 as finance chief and business chief, became president in October 2025, and helped take the business public. The release did not name a successor.
💲 Other KPIs
Total cash, short-term investments and restricted cash fell by $24.8 million from last quarter's $256.3 million, by our math. The proteomics group raised $197.8 million in its April initial public offering and repaid $9.8 million of term debt earlier this year, leaving more than two years of cash at the current burn rate.
Stockpiles of machines and chemical kits rose 19.2% from last quarter and 40.7% from the end of 2025, by our math. Inventory now equals more than four quarters of cost of goods sold, tying up cash ahead of expected study deliveries.
Weighted-average shares rosenearly sixfold from 11.6 million a year ago and up 17.8% from 58.7 million in the second quarter. The jump reflects the April stock offering and the conversion of preferred stock and notes into common shares, which shrank the net loss per share to $0.19 even as the dollar loss grew.
🔮 Guidance
Raised. Management lifted the middle of the full-year range by $4 million, calling for 64% growth over 2025. By our math, that leaves $33.0 million for the fourth quarter, down 1.6% from the third quarter and up about 31% from a year ago against a tough comparison from two large year-ago orders.
❓ Key Questions
How many ARGO machines did Alamar place this quarter?
Instrument revenue sped up to 50% growth from 35% in the second quarter, but management only reports the installed base once a year. Investors need to know whether unit placements or higher machine prices drove the rebound.
When do the UK Biobank and GSK studies start?
The two partnerships cover 140,000 blood samples, but the release did not give a delivery schedule or dollar value. Knowing how much revenue lands in 2026 versus 2027 would clarify the fourth-quarter outlook.
Did one customer still make up over 10% of sales?
One customer accounted for 11% of revenue in the second quarter, and services jumped another 18% from last quarter. Concentration in a single study would make quarterly sales lumpier when that project ends.
What is the status of the Olink patent lawsuit?
A patent tribunal upheld Olink's patent in March 2026 and the federal court case resumed, targeting the core NULISA chemistry. The earnings release gave no update on the motion to dismiss or the appeal.