Qiagen N.V. (QGEN) Q2 2026 Earnings Report, Transcript and Summary

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. I am Shelly, your global meet operator. Welcome, and thank you for joining Qiagen's Q2 2026 Earnings Conference Call webcast. [Operator Instructions] Please be advised that the call is being recorded at Qiagen's request and will be made available on the Internet website. [Operator Instructions] At this time, I would like to introduce your host, Daniel Wendorff, Vice President, Head of Investor Relations at Qiagen. Please go ahead.

Thank you, operator, and welcome to our call for the second quarter of 2026. We appreciate your time and interest in Qiagen. Joining the call today are Thierry Bernard, our Chief Executive Officer; and Roland Sackers, our Chief Financial Officer. Also joining us is Dr. Domenica Martorana from our Investor Relations team. As always, today's call is being webcast live and will be archived in the Investor Relations section of our website at www.qiagen.com, where you can find the press release and presentation accompanying this call. Please also note that this call will include forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ materially from those projected due to a number of factors outlined in our most recent Form 20-F and other filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. We will also refer to certain financial measures not prepared in accordance with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles or GAAP, that provide additional insights into our performance. Reconciliations to the most directly comparable GAAP figures are in the release and presentation. All references to earnings per share refer to adjusted diluted EPS. With that, let me hand over the call to you -- let me hand over the call to you, Thierry.

Thank you, Daniel. Hello, and good morning, good afternoon or good evening, depending on where you are in the world, and thank you for joining us. Let me start by thanking again our teams across Qiagen for their continued dedication and disciplined execution. Their focus enabled us to deliver results above our outlook while continuing to invest in our portfolio and focus on profitable growth. Let me now walk you through our key messages for today. First, we exceeded our outlook for both sales and adjusted EPS. Net sales were $535 million and unchanged on both a reported basis and at CER. This was ahead of our outlook for an approximately 2% decline CER. Adjusted diluted EPS was $0.62 on both a reported basis and at CER again, above our outlook of at least $0.60 at CER. Those results demonstrate the resilience of our business and provide further confidence in our outlook for the year. Second key message, our growth pillars delivered 5% growth at CER, profitably above market growth. Sample Technologies led the quarter, reflecting continued demand for our sample preparation solutions. QIAcuity delivered another solid quarter, driven by healthy consumables demand. QDI, our bioinformatics business also performed well, led by our clinical application. QuantiFERON returned to growth as solid demand across many testing groups more than offset the significant decline in U.S. immigration testing demand. This U.S. immigration testing demand decrease is what we highlighted at the end of our Q1 2026. QIAstat Diagnostic was impacted by a challenging prior year comparison in respiratory testing, partially offset by continued strong growth in our gastrointestinal and meningitis/encephalitis panels with the gastrointestinal panel performing particularly well. Third key message, we maintain a very high level of profitability. This reflects our ability to improve efficiency while continuing to invest for future growth. Fourth, we continue to generate strong cash flow, providing the financial flexibility to invest in the business while returning capital to shareholders. This financial strength enabled us to increase our annual dividend by 40% in 2026. And this brings me to my final key message for today, our outlook for 2026. We are reaffirming our full year outlook and remain confident in stronger growth during the second half of the year. The continued performance of our growth pillars and the progress we are making across our portfolio reinforce our confidence in delivering the outlook we have set for the year. With that, I'll turn over to Roland for more details on the financials.

Thank you, Thierry, and hello, everyone. As Thierry highlighted, we delivered a better-than-expected second quarter, exceeding our outlook for both sales and adjusted diluted EPS while maintaining a high level of profitability. Let me start with our sales performance across the 4 product groups. Sample Technologies rose 9% CER, driven by automated consumables and higher instrument sales compared to the year ago period. Diagnostic solutions declined 2% at CER. QuantiFERON returned to growth at 1% CER as solid demand across most testing groups more than offset reduced immigration testing demand, primarily in the U.S. and Middle East. QIAstat-Dx sales declined 7% at constant exchange rates despite growth in GI and meningitis panels. However, this was more than offset by lower respiratory panel sales against a challenging prior year comparison previously communicated. In PCR and nucleic acid amplification, sales declined 8% at CER. Our digital PCR system, QIAcuity, delivered double-digit growth at CER, driven by strong consumables demand. This is more than offset by weaker OEM demand. [Technical Difficulty]

[Operator Instructions] You may continue.

Okay. Sorry for that. It looks like we had some technical difficulties, but I do think we are now back on a call. So let me continue. In PCR and nucleic acid amplifications, sales declined 8% at CER. Our digital PCR system, QIAcuity, delivered double-digit growth at CER, driven by strong consumables demand. This was more than offset by weaker OEM demand. In the genomics and NGS product group, sales rose 2% CER. Qiagen Digital Insights delivered solid single-digit growth, while consumables for universal NGS panels used on third-party sequencers grew more than 20% CER. Lower sales of other genomics products moderated the overall growth rate. Regional performance was mixed during the quarter. Sales in the Americas rose 1% CER, led by 2% growth in North America, while sales declined in Brazil and Mexico. In the EMEA region, sales declined 2% CER. While Spain, Belgium and Poland were up in the quarter, Germany, France and Italy were down. In the Asia Pacific region, sales declined 2% CER. Excluding China, the region grew at a low single-digit rate at constant exchange rates, supported by high teens growth in Japan, while China was down in the low teens. Sequentially, sales in China improved at a double-digit percentage rate. Moving down the income statement. Profitability remained at a high level. Adjusted operating income declined 2% and reached USD 157 million. The adjusted operating income margin was 29.4% compared with 29.9% in the second quarter of '25. Disciplined cost management and efficiency gains helped offset gross margin headwinds. The adjusted gross margin was 66.2% in the quarter compared with 66.7% in the prior year period due to changes in product mix. Operating expenses remained broadly stable as a percentage of sales. Sequentially, the adjusted operating income margin increased by 200 basis points from 27.4% in the first quarter of '26 with higher operating leverage contributing to the improvement. Adjusted diluted EPS was $0.62 at constant exchange rates, exceeding the outlook of at least $0.60 at CER. The adjusted tax rate was 18% in the quarter, in line with our target of 17% to 18%. The high level of profitability also translated into solid cash generation. Operating cash flow was $301 million for the first 6 months of '26, unchanged from the same period of '25. This was achieved despite approximately $20 million of cash payments for efficiency and restructuring programs and a planned increase in inventory. Cash generation was supported by disciplined working capital management and a higher level of profitability. Improved receivables collection and other working capital movements helped offset the inventory build. Days sales outstanding improved to approximately 55 days from approximately 57 days at the end of '25. Days inventory outstanding increased to 153 days from 149 days at the end of '25, reflecting inventory build in preparation for new product launches. Our high level of profitability and cash generation continues to support a strong balance sheet. This gives us the flexibility to invest in innovation, pursue targeted acquisitions and return capital to shareholders. In line with this approach, we completed a $500 million synthetic share repurchase in January and paid our second annual dividend of around $72 million in July. The dividend per share increased by 40% to $0.35 from $0.25 in '25. With that, let me hand back the call to Thierry.

Thank you, Roland. And let me now highlight some of the recent progress of our teams in our portfolio. Let's start with Sample Technologies. We continue to make good progress with our automation strategy as more laboratories transition from manual to automated sample preparation. With the commercial launch of QIAsymphony Connect, our new IVD compliant automation system, we reached another important milestone in expanding our automation portfolio. We have started also placing QIAsprint Connect and are pleased with the number of placements, the high level of customer acceptance and the very positive initial feedback, especially from pharma company. QIAmini, our third launch for this year, remains on track for launch this fall with beta field testing beginning in North America in the coming weeks. We are also making very good progress in single cell analysis with Parse. We recently launched the next generation of immune profiling solutions, further expanding our single cell offering. Parse was also selected for a NASA supported research program aboard the International Space Station, supporting research into new treatments for cartilage injuries. Together, those developments show how we are broadening our portfolio while enabling new areas of research in latent tuberculosis testing. As latent tuberculosis screening continues to expand, laboratories are looking for more efficient ways to manage growing testing volumes. Together with DiaSorin and our new automation partner, Inpeco, we plan to launch the first fully automated Sample to Insight workflow in the second half of 2027. This combines sample handling, incubation and detection into one purpose-built automated workflow for QuantiFERON testing. We are also developing an AI-enabled tool to help assess the risk of progression to active TB, providing clinicians with additional insights beyond the detection of latent TB infections. This is how we continue to innovate around QuantiFERON, creating additional value for laboratories and clinicians. On QIAstat, we continue to expand the menu into new testing areas. Bloodstream infections require rapid treatment decisions. With the launch of our 2 new BCID panels, QIAstat now expands into bloodstream infection testing in Europe, providing laboratories with broad coverage across relevant pathogens and antimicrobial resistance markers. Together, those 2 panels detect 33 pathogens and 28 antimicrobial resistance markers in about 1 hour time to result. The next step is to bring those panels to the U.S., and we are confident to get our FDA approval by the end of the year. We are also seeing the value of menu expansion for QIAstat in the field. An example is that during the ongoing cyclospora outbreak in the U.S., our large gastrointestinal panel is helping laboratories respond to increasing testing demand. Turning to digital PCR and QIAcuity now. We continue to advance digital PCR across research, biopharma and clinical application. As more customers are moving from qPCR to digital PCR, they are looking for workflows that are scalable, automated and easy to standardize. This is why we continue to expand the QIAcuity portfolio. This year, in the second half of the year, we are launching new gene expression assays together with a high multiplex kit for the analysis of up to 12 RNA targets in a single reaction. We are also expanding our cell and gene therapy offering with new software and broader workflow automation through our collaboration with Hamilton. We recently demonstrated again the flexibility of QIAcuity during the recent Ebola outbreak, where we rapidly introduced custom digital PCR assays to support infectious disease research and surveillance. Finally, let me touch on Qiagen digital insights development. AI is becoming increasingly important in biomedical research as researchers work with growing amounts of data, but AI is only as valuable as the scientific knowledge behind it. This is where QDI, Qiagen Digital Insights comes in. We combined more than 25 years of curated biomedical knowledge with AI to turn complex biological data into meaningful insights. We, for example, recently announced a new collaboration with NVIDIA. Together, we are combining our curated biomedical knowledge with accelerated computing and graph-based AI. This will help researchers all over the world accelerating drug discovery. With that, let me hand it back to Roland with the details of our outlook for the second half of the year.

Thank you, Thierry. Let me now provide an update on our outlook for '26 and the third quarter. For the full year, we are reaffirming our outlook for total net sales growth of about 1 to 2 percentage points at CER. We also continue to expect adjusted diluted EPS of at least $2.43 at CER. For the third quarter, we expect total net sales growth of about 1% to 2% CER and adjusted diluted EPS of at least $0.62 at CER. I would like to give you some additional perspectives on the expected performance in the second half of the year. We expect CER sales growth to improve from minus 1% in the first half to about 3% to 4% in the second half. This represents a sequential improvement of approximately 4 to 5 percentage points. There are 3 main drivers behind this development. First, the end of the year-on-year headwinds from the discontinued NeuMoDx and DIALUNOX portfolio is expected to contribute approximately 2 percentage points to the improvement in the second half. Second, we expect approximately another 2 percentage points from increasing contributions from new Sample tech systems and other recent and planned product launches. This include QIAsymphony Connect and QIAsprint Connect in Sample Technologies. The rollout of our new BCID panels and continued momentum in companion diagnostics for QIAstat-Dx and additional offerings for QIAcuity. As mentioned earlier, QuantiFERON delivered a stronger second quarter. We continue to believe that we are tracking towards our $500 million target for '26 with easier comparisons expected to support performance in the fourth quarter. Third, we expect approximately 0.5 percentage point from the combined benefits of Parse, which is performing ahead of our original '26 sales target of about USD 40 million and modestly improving trends in the U.S. life science environment. Within the second half, growth is expected to be weighted towards the fourth quarter, which benefits from the incremental contributions from the previously mentioned product launches and an easier prior year comparison following the disruption caused by the U.S. government shutdown in the fourth quarter of '25. The expected allocation towards the second half is also consistent with our historical sales phasing. Approximately 47% of our full year sales are generated in the first half and approximately 53% in the second half of the year. On the topic of tariff repayments, we foresee for the full year. Net of customer refunds, this could be a benefit of about $0.02 EPS at CER. This is already included in our outlook and any additional benefit would be incremental also to our guidance. Finally, let me briefly address currency trends. For the full year, we currently expect a tailwind of about 1 percentage point on sales and a neutral impact on adjusted diluted EPS. This is unchanged from our previous assumptions. For Q3, currency is expected to have a negative impact of about 1 percentage point on net sales, but be neutral on adjusted diluted EPS. With that, I'll now hand it back to Thierry.

Thank you, Roland. And now let me briefly summarize before we move to the Q&A session. First, we delivered a quarter above our outlook for both sales and adjusted EPS. At the same time, we maintained a high level of profitability while continuing to invest in our portfolio. Our growth pillars continue to perform well, delivering above-market growth, led by Sample Tech, QIAcuity and QDI, while QuantiFERON returned to growth. We are making good progress in our product launches, supporting our growth ambition for the second half of the year and beyond. Together, the performance of our growth pillars and the progresses on new launches reinforce our confidence in a stronger second half of 2026. So in closing, we remain focused on achieving the outlook we have set for this year and delivering solid profitable growth. With that, I would now like to hand back to the operator for the Q&A session. Thanks a lot once again for your attention.

[Operator Instructions] We will now take the first question comes from your line of Casey Woodring with JPMorgan.

Maybe just walk through the updated guide for us. I think the back half, you took down from 4% to 3% to 4%. Just maybe walk through kind of what's changed? And then any sort of seasonality that you're assuming from 3Q to 4Q, the step-up that you talked about a little bit Roland in 4Q. Maybe just walk us through the drivers there.

Thanks, Casey. I can take the first half of your question and in Roland's comments, we described also the weight of H2 and the traditional seasonality beyond Q4. But -- so first of all, we believe in that acceleration for the reasons that we highlighted. And by the way, we also highlighted the same reason in our Q1 release. You have obviously some positive impact coming from the stop of headwinds coming from the discontinuation last year of NeuMoDx and DIALUNOX. And we expected -- we expect also a significant input from our new launches, especially in Sample tech, but also the new panel that we described today for QIAstat. But at the same time, we want to remain cautious. There is no doubt in our view, Casey, that, for example, funding, especially in the U.S., is improving sequentially. We see indeed an improved funding, especially for research and academia in Q2 compared to Q1. At the same time, we need to highlight that if you consider, for example, the funding coming from NIH in the U.S., it is still below in H1 of 2026 compared to H1 2025. So we see improvement, but we remain also cautious because, as you know, the lack of funding sometimes reflects on capital sales and abilities from labs to invest into new instruments. At the same time, we will benefit definitely from an easier comp from Q4 '25 compared to Q4 '26. Remember that last year, we started the year quite strong in Q1 '25 at 7% growth. We finished the year in Q4 '25 at 1% growth. This is why we have an easier comp. Roland, do you want to give more details on the weight of the different quarters?

Yes. And probably a couple of different perspectives. First of all, just on some of the products, right? What we just described, Casey is, again, you heard that sample prep is doing quite well, improving quarter-over-quarter. We had now in the first half, 9% growth rate. Again, that will move double digit in the second half of the year, right? QIAstat, we just talked about that for the first half, there was clearly a significant headwind coming from the respiratory business last year. We do believe that business also, again, will turn probably high single, more likely low double-digit growth rate as well in the second half of the year. QIAcuity is probably even accelerating while it's already high double digit in Q1 -- sorry, in H1. So I think there's a lot of things where we, I would say, also have reasonable visibility in a given market environment. So I would say there's things like that. But one thing to you mentioned it before, that is one thing this product launches, right? It takes some time that they gain traction, sample prep, you see it. But of course, every quarter, having instruments on the market, customers getting used to that is being helpful. There is, I think, the natural reason that the fourth quarter will be a stronger one. And have in mind also QIAmini is going to hit within the third quarter, the market. So there's clearly also contribution coming in the first quarter as well.

We'll now take your next question coming from the line of Jack Meehan with Oberon Research.

For Thierry. So you've announced the strategic review and still have the CEO search going on. I was wondering how should we view the status of the strategic review when a new CEO is named? Does that mean the review stopped? Or could that continue as a separate topic? Any thoughts would be great.

Yes. So I think you need to consider that those are 2 complementary but also independent processes. The CEO search, obviously, is one of the highest duty of the Board. We are progressing. We confirm that the transition will happen in H2 of 2026. But at the same time, we have always outlined that our company is always open to consider options to increase shareholder value and stakeholder value. And the Board and management are also fully aware of their fiduciary responsibilities when such discussions might happen. And so it's a constant process at Qiagen where we are constantly looking at the best way to improve value for our shareholders. So I think this is why I continue to say that those processes are natural, long-lasting processes. And the transition with the new CEO should not be viewed as an obstacle to constant improvement of shareholders' value, obviously not. So the 2 processes are going together.

Your next question comes from the line of Tycho Peterson with Jefferies.

I want to start with QuantiFERON. You came ahead this quarter, but then you did soften the language on the full year target to "working towards $500 million." Are you baking in incremental headwinds from competition here in the back half of the year? I guess what's changing in the guide on QuantiFERON? And then a follow-up -- just a follow-up on Jack's question. On the strategic review, what's really on the table here? Is this portfolio changes? Is it restructuring? Is it a different mix of capital allocation? I mean you've done a lot. You've gotten rid of NeuMoDx, you're paying a dividend. You have good margins. So I'm just curious how you think about the option set as you do the strategic review.

Let me start with the second part of your question, Tycho, and then I will move to QuantiFERON. We are having constant broad strategic reviews. First of all, as you know, we have always said that this company should focus, and we focus where we can gain the most market shares and when we can establish leadership position. This is why we are constantly reviewing the profitability and the return on investment of our different developments in R&D. So it does include the constant assessment, obviously, of our different pillars of growth. Second, it involves also, as I said before, to be always open for discussion as long as we see that it can create value on the long term for our shareholders, for our stakeholders and also when we see a feasibility to a potential basically alliance for another -- with another company. So it's basically a very thorough analysis on everywhere we can make progresses to create more shareholder value. On QuantiFERON itself, I believe we took the right decision at the end of Q1 when we saw the real decrease of migrant testing to take out $35 million of revenues. We said at the end of Q1 that we don't believe that this situation will change drastically in the coming months, the second half of 2026 or even beyond that. That was the right decision to be taken. At the same time, Tycho, we continue to very much make progress in other applications and the development of market shares. First, we continue to convert TST customers to blood test with our latent TB testing. Second, we continue to enter into new applications. We told you 2 years ago, for example, that diabetes was becoming an interesting testing field for latent TB. And if you remember, we said in 2025 that we believe that patients ongoing dialysis were also a significant application potential for latent TB testing. We are starting to implement that. For example, with significant testing labs in the U.S. with the group DaVita, for example. As regard to competition, the fact that new competitors are coming to the market is showing that Qiagen was right many years ago to decide to invest into latent TB testing because I remind you, there is a significant need worldwide for this kind of testing. We showed clearly in our IR session last year that 2 billion people in the world are impacted by latent TB. So the fact that new competitors are entering the market can be seen also positively because it will increase or continue to increase awareness for this kind of testing. And therefore, for me, it's probably going to increase the total available market for latent TB testing worldwide. For H2, now more precisely to your questions. The first thing, first of all, to highlight is, as we highlighted with Roland, Q2 returns to positive growth. We also highlighted in our press release that in Q3, we are going to be slightly impacted by a very strong comp of Q3 2025, especially in the U.S. But overall, we believe that H2 will return to growth, and then we can achieve our target to keep $500 million revenues for QuantiFERON overall. Growth will strengthen as we move into 2027 with our 2 new major development, the partnership with Inpeco and the AI scored results that we are going to launch towards the end of the year next year. Competition has always existed Tycho. Our main competitor is the traditional skin test. We had an existing competition for many years with Revvity, and we have seen the market new entrants. At the moment, we do not see an impact on our market shares. We are prepared to compete commercially and product-wise against any new entrants. But I repeat, the main competitor remain the TST and our main objective remains to continue to convert more TST customers to blood testing.

Your next question comes from the line of Michael Ryskin with Bank of America.

First, I want to ask real quick on capital deployment. You had a share authorization at the AGM, but yet it doesn't look like you bought back any shares in the second quarter. Just curious why. Is this have something to do with the strategic review where you kind of want to get that finalized before you deploy capital? Or is there some reason you kind of held back? And I'll throw in a second one, if I can, at the same time. On the Sample Tech business, that continues to do really well, both organic and Parse. You kind of talked about some of the upside to Parse. And obviously, you've got a lot of the automation coming in the new products that you've talked about. Just want to maybe get a sense of your thoughts on that, how that plays out in the second half as you got a little bit tougher comps and beyond, both on the organic and new launches and also on what the upside from Parse could be.

So thanks, Michael. And I will take the first part, and I will ask Roland to chime in on the capital deployment strategy. As you noticed, you're right, Michael, it's going very well, but it's a proof that our automation strategy that we started back in 2021 is paying off. I remind you, we started to upgrade some of our existing instruments. QIAcube became QIAcube Connect, EZ1 became EZ2. And this year, we have those 3 new launches. So organically, this is the proof that this strategy is paying off. We continue to see good growth in automated sample tech, and we are absolutely convinced that more customers will move from manual sample tech to automation. So we are having the good set of answers. This is strengthened by the acquisition of Parse because it allows our sample tech portfolio to move into single cells, and we invested and acquired Parse for 2 main reasons. First of all, because the solution of Parse is very highly differentiated compared to existing competition. First, as you know, it's an instrument-free solution. So the ease of use is uncomparable. But at the same time, to address the large volume needs, we can offer also solution with what we call our GigaLab with Parse. And we see that activity also growing very well. The second main differentiation is the number of sales that we can cover with the Parse solutions, which is also uncomparable. This is, for example, behind the fact that we have been chosen by NASA as we highlighted during this call. We told you last year and at the beginning of this year, that the contribution of Parse into our revenues for '26 should be around $40 million. With the development of Q1 and Q2, we believe that we have this number into control, and we can probably exceed it. And now going to Roland for the capital allocation strategy for the coming months.

Mike, there's always a lot of reasons when to do and when not to do a share buyback at the end of the day. But one thing you have to have in mind, after an AGM, typically debt holders have an opposition period and that in Europe takes somewhere between 2 and 3 months. It's more technical. Typically, there's never any feedback, but you have to wait for that.

Your next question will come from the line of Odysseas Manesiotis with BNP Paribas.

I've got 2. Firstly, on the organic growth acceleration implied by your Q3 guide, specifically, I mean, on the midpoint organically, I'm getting around 50 bps acceleration. Wouldn't it be fair to assume improving growth in Sample tech, QIAstat and PCR and nucleic acids given your instrument launches, easing comps and improving funding releases here. Could you help us piece out the divisional growth here relative to Q2 and Q3? And secondly, could you -- I mean, looking at QIAstat, Q2 growth underperformed most of your peers here. And I understand you're relatively more reliant on respiratory, given you're still early on with the GI launches and meningitis, but you held up relatively better in Q4 and Q1. Could you give us some additional color on the Q2 weakness, please? And have you started seeing more U.S. wins since the Rise launch?

So different questions. I will start with QIAstat and then move to Q3 and versus Q4. QIAstat, I wouldn't say Odysseas, that we are more exposed to respiratory panels than our competitors. Respiratory panels in syndromic testing account for roughly 65% of the total volume of testing. So it is clear that everybody is sensitive to a stronger flu season or a weaker flu season. Q2 is never -- if you look at our trends in testing for QIAstat over the last years, a very strong quarter for respiratory. Why? Because you are coming out of winter, but in the Northern Hemisphere. And at the same time, you are not completely in winter in many other parts of the world. So this explains the weaker numbers on respiratory. It is true that for the last 12 months, us, but also our competitors are seeing weaker flu season. At the same time, and this is the objective of our strategic vision of developing the menu of QIAstat, we are extremely pleased by the very good growth of GI. The relevance also, you have seen the cyclospora example that I gave today. We have meningitis developing very well, especially in Northern Europe, but also starting in the U.S. And we will have for the second half of the year, the BCID panel because as we said today, blood infections are key issues for customers. We now have that blood culture panel CE marked. We expect to have it FDA approved during the fourth quarter of this year. This will help the growth. A second good factor that will help the growth in end of Q3 and Q4 is that there will be a winter again in the Northern Hemisphere. The problem is not that much to know whether it's going to be a strong flu or weak flu. There will be flu. And here, we will be relevant. And here, you will see an acceleration of our respiratory testing. In the U.S., which remains the main market for syndromic testing, as you know, we have taken significant decisions from an organization standpoint, new sales, salespeople on the field, more specialized, new leadership. This is starting to pay off. And indeed, to your point, where we have the largest volumes of customers, we start to see a good uptake of our QIAstat Rise instrument in North America. So that's the context for QIAstat. And this is why we are confident in a double-digit growth for the second half of the year for QIAstat. Now coming back to your point on Q3 versus Q4. I mean in Q3, we will continue. We have no reason to consider that, for example, Sample tech will slow down. We believe that Sample Tech will continue to perform well because, again, in Q3, we will be more uptake -- we will see more uptake of our new launches, and we see the continuous development of parse. Digital PCR will continue to perform well. Overall between Q3 and Q4, you will see a continuing good development of capital sales and consumables, and this will be also strengthened by the launch of our new set of panels around gene expression. At the same time, as we disclosed today, we know that Q3 will be impacted by a very strong comp on QuantiFERON, especially on North America from Q3 of 2025. This is how we see the development of Q3 versus Q4. Obviously, if we can beat our target for Q3, we will do it. But it's, I think, a very mature and realistic analysis to set that guidance for Q3 and also that acceleration for Q4.

And just one incremental comment to that because I do think while everybody has it somewhere, I just want to put it also play on the table, right? We shouldn't forget that, again, there's $35 million of immigration sales for QuantiFERON, which are as a market, not accessible for us anymore for anybody. And if you just put that in the percentage growth rate, that is more or less already 6% to 7% growth rate. So again, at the end of the day, that is what we have to compensate. And again, last year, as Thierry just mentioned, Q3 was an 11% growth rate for QuantiFERON. So it is a very strong comparable quarter. The rest of the business is actually, as I said, hard to complain sample prep double-digit second half, QIAstat double-digit second half, QIAcuity double digit. Again, I don't think that we can complain too much. And also again, the headwind Q1 next year on QuantiFERON is history.

Your next question will come from the line of Dan Arias with Stifel.

Thierry, on the fully automated QuantiFERON solution that you're bringing to market. I know none of this product development is easy, so I don't mean to trivialize the effort. But why 1.5 years to get that product to market? What are the major steps or hurdles to getting that to customers maybe ahead of another competitive option getting into the market?

Well, because first of all, you need to develop 2 new instruments and adjust them to the specific workflow of QuantiFERON. Those 2 new systems are a dedicated aliquoter and a dedicated incubator. And then you have to make sure that you can connect all those pieces together to build that first fully automation sample in, result out. So to your question, developing and adapting 2 new instruments in, I would say, something like a year, it's quite a performance -- it's quite a performance. And then obviously, we need to test it with customers. It will be an investment on their side, and we will need to make sure that it is perfectly adapted to their workflow. So there will be some customization. We will work, and we have started to work, especially with our key accounts on making sure that, that workflow from a footprint, from a volume is going to be completely adjusted to their needs. What makes me very confident is that we have started introducing this workflow with a fairly deep level of details to our main customers, main key accounts in the U.S., main key accounts in Europe. And the acceptance, the interest, the welcoming of this presentation is even beyond our expectation with many sites indeed asking to be the pilot site for this fully integrated workflow. But you still need to develop those instruments. You still need to make sure that the workflow is seamless. And I believe that a year to 1.5 years is not that long. You need to validate also the workflow. You need to push it to regulatory approval. So second half of '27 is a realistic time line, and I continue to believe that there will be first installation in that time frame.

Next question will come from the line of Dan Brennan with TD Cowen.

Maybe I'll just ask 2 and then kind of mute and listen. Maybe on the first one, Thierry, I think you mentioned upfront to, I think, Jack's question on the strategic plan, both internal efficiency gains and also looking at potential strategic acquirers to maximize value. Could you just comment how management and/or the Board think about private equity versus strategic acquirers? Are they the same? Are they different given PE will typically look at deals and be more cost cut driven versus strategic corporates are going to be probably more growth interested? And then, I guess, b, maybe as we look ahead and kind of when we turn the page, I think consensus right now sits at 5% CER for 2027. So a decent rebound in easy comps. Just wondering if you guys can offer any initial thoughts about how you're looking to exit this year and kind of what that sets up for next year?

Well, I would say on the first one, first, I will highlight something because I heard twice in that call the end of the process. And this is not the message that I want to leave with you guys. There is not a date end of a process of continuously assessing the best pathways forward for Qiagen. It's a continuous project. Very regularly during the year, management is reviewing and assessing those options with our Board. And we are not going to stop that at a given point. I think it's management's responsibility to constantly present to the Board options for better shareholder value. So that's the first thing. Now on your question, [ P ] versus strategic, first of all, as you know, Dan, I won't comment in too many details. There are pros and cons on both sides. This is not what is our main driver. Our main driver is to decide, is it better for Qiagen with our midterm plan, with our objective of sales, profitability, return to shareholders? Is it better to continue organically and independently? Would that make sense to have a strategic partner? Or would that make sense to have a more financial-driven partner? What of those solutions is driving the main shareholder value? For our shareholders, but also for our stakeholders, the Qiageners, the legacy that we have built for more than 40 years now. Now regarding the consensus, and Roland, feel free to chime in on this. We are not in a midterm call here, Dan. So I will clearly say our ambition as management for the moment is to deliver on Q3, is to deliver on Q4 to deliver the full guidance that we gave at the beginning of this year. and to continue to improve profitability. The market has not become easier around us. And despite this, this company continues to deliver profitable growth. You have seen that in Q2. That's my main target. We have a target set since our Capital Market Day in June 2024. We are still working towards that. That's what I can say at this moment.

The last question comes from the line of Jan Koch with Deutsche Bank.

My first one is on instruments. You reported a low teens decline in Q2 despite mid-singledigit growth in Sample Tech instruments. in which product category specifically have you seen the highest declines? And most life science companies have actually highlighted improving order trends in lab instruments in Q2. So are you seeing similar trends? And secondly, on QIAstat, how is the development of the complicated UTI panel progressing? And yes, when could you launch this test? Based on the high clinical need for this solution, how do you see the financial opportunity?

So let's start with stat and the CAUTI, and then I'll go to the instrument trends and capital sales. The reason why we have extremely good expectation on these complicated UTI panels are mainly twofold. First of all, because, Jan, as you highlighted yourself, this is a significant unmet need for clinicians and for labs all over the world. And once again, you need to understand, we are not talking traditional UTI. This is covered by mainly chip solutions. We are talking about complicated UTI, life-threatening UTI. And there, this is where we have a significant unmet need. And this is a good segue to the second reason to be optimistic is that none of our competitors will have this panel. And to date, none of our competitors have announced that they are developing such a panel. The development progresses very well, and we are still confident that this test will be available for Europe, Europe first in the second half of 2027. And when I say that, I mean, obviously CE Mark, and then we will move to the U.S. You need to understand, Jan, that any time you launch such an innovative panel, there is a period of time where you will have to do clinical and medical education. I have no doubt that our prospect will immediately see the value of the panel, but you need basically to help them changing their testing habit. It always takes time. So we will have to invest in medical education. But the potential of that test, given the unmet need that I highlighted at the beginning is significant. And this will be a very good tool, as we said before, to also help mitigating the respiratory panel going high or going low, depending on the strength of the respiratory season. So it's a very good development. It's a very good strategic development. Now on capital sales. We have said and we continue to say and we have said this even starting in '25, we do see indeed a sequential improvement of funding for research and academia. And this obviously helps capital sales. At the same time, we also highlight that despite that sequential improvement in Q2, for example, compared to Q1 of '26, the NIH outlay year-to-date '26 is still lower than '25. So we remain cautious. We see good progresses, but we remain cautious. And as Roland highlighted in his comments, when you launch a new instrument such as QIAsymphony Connect, such as QIAsprint, for example, Jan, you need to spend some time with customers to validate the new instrument to adjust it to their own needs. That takes a bit of time. So this is why we see that performance of Q2 for capital sales at Qiagen, still lower funding and at the same time, progressive uptake of our new launches. This is how you should see that. But those are good investments for the future. You will see a significant level of QIAsprint placement when we will disclose the numbers at the end of '26. This is creating growth for the future. You will see good placement of QIAsymphony Connect. This will create consumables for the coming years. And as Roland highlighted as well, we will launch also the QIAmini. So if you combine those 2 factors, new systems plus sequential improvement of funding, this gives us good reasons to be optimistic.

This is now -- there will be no more -- this is the end of the Q&A session. I will now turn it back to Daniel for any closing remarks.

Thank you. I would like to close this conference call, and thank you for your participation. If you have any questions or comments, please do not hesitate to contact us. Thank you very much.

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes the conference call. Thank you for joining, and have a pleasant day. Goodbye.