NEW YORK – Invitae said after the close of the market on Tuesday that its first quarter revenues increased 61 percent from Q1 2020, exceeding the consensus Wall Street estimate.
For the period ended March 31, the San Francisco-based genetic testing company reported $103.6 million in revenues, up from $64.2 million a year ago. Analysts, on average, had projected revenues of $101.5 million.
"We had a very strong start to the year, experiencing record daily volumes, and we expect that momentum to continue into the coming years," Sean George, cofounder and CEO of Invitae, said in a statement.
The company's revenues from testing during Q1 2021 totaled $99.3 million, a 57 percent increase from $63.1 million in Q1 2020. Other revenues tripled during the quarter to $4.3 million compared to $1.2 million in the prior year.
Starting in Q4 2020, the company stopped reporting accessioned samples and now reports billable volume. During the first quarter, the company billed 259,000 tests, a 72 percent increase from the same period last year when it billed 151,000 tests. International sales comprised 18 percent of the company's billable volume during the quarter, "driven by the strength of our decentralized oncology business and our continued expansion in Europe, Japan, Australia, and Israel," said Invitae CFO Shelly Guyer during a call with analysts and investors.
The company also signed 25 deals with biopharma partners during the quarter including several sponsored testing programs. According to Guyer, Invitae's oncology business customer mix now includes a greater proportion of biopharma and other business-to-business customers.
Its R&D expenses were $80.4 million, up 44 percent from $55.7 million in the year-ago quarter, while SG&A expenses were $60.1 million, down 9 percent from $66 million a year ago.
Invitae's net loss for the quarter totaled $109.5 million, or $.56 per share, compared to a net loss of $98.5 million, or $.99 per share, in Q1 2020. Adjusted net loss for the quarter was $122.2 million, or $.63 per share, more than analysts' average estimate of a $.59 per share loss.
Invitae ended the quarter with $194.2 million in cash and cash equivalents, and $477.4 million in marketable securities. In January the firm sold approximately 8.9 million shares of its common stock at $51.50 per share, which yielded net proceeds of $434.3 million.
Early into the second quarter, Invitae announced a $200 million deal to acquire Genosity and use its software and lab solutions to expedite the development and decentralized market launch of its somatic and germline oncology test offerings. Invitae has previously said that Genosity's technology and capabilities would help it develop a distributed version of its Personalized Cancer Monitoring, or PCM test, a blood-based diagnostic for the early detection of cancer recurrence, which it garnered through the purchase of ArcherDx last year.
"Standing up PCM as a laboratory-developed test and getting it all validated, approved, and built into our tech infrastructure was going to take some time and expense," George said during the call, adding that Genosity can quickly get a distributed test up and running, since around 60 percent of its revenues comes from doing just this type of work for its biopharma partners. "It proved to be a great opportunity to accelerate our broader launch for PCM."
Also in April, a group of investors led by Softbank Group subsidiary SB Management made a $1.15 billion investment in convertible senior notes to support Invitae's growth initiatives, including the development of new tests and acquisition of complementary tests and companies.
"Our Q1 revenues and current trends have us increasingly confident that we will exceed the $450 million in revenue guidance for the year," Guyer said.
In early morning trading on the Nasdaq on Wednesday, Invitae's stock was down around 8 percent at around $28.86.