Scientific Industries Q4 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

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April 1, 2025

Key Takeaways

  • Scientific Industries added two industry veterans to its board—former Codexis CEO John Nichols and ex-ACC Inc. president Michael Blackmon—to leverage their expertise in synthetic biology and pharma process control for future growth.
  • The company streamlined operations in FY2024, cutting operating expenses by nearly $3 million and reducing cash used in operations by $2.5 million.
  • It launched the final component of its Vivid pharmacy automation line—the high-precision Workstation pill counter—which has already sold six units and is positioned to replace over 13,000 aging ICON systems in independent and chain pharmacies.
  • SBI’s bioprocessing segment saw 24% sales growth, a 31% Q4 year-over-year revenue increase, and a 94% surge in pipeline value to $4 million, driven by successful DOTS platform launches and strong industry adoption.
  • Looking ahead to FY2025, the company plans to introduce a machine-learning pill-counting model, advance pH and liquid injection R&D, and capitalize on a projected bioprocessing market rebound powered by AI and digital tools.
AI Generated. May Contain Errors.
Earnings Conference Call
Scientific Industries Q4 2024
00:00 / 00:00

Transcript Sections

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Operator

Today, and welcome to the Scientific Industries Report's Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2024 Financial Results Conference Call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. Please note that this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Joe Diaz with some partners. Please go ahead.

Joe Diaz
Managing Partner at Lytham Partners

Thank you. Good morning, and thank all of you for joining us today to review Scientific Industries' financial results for the fiscal year 2024 ended December 31, 2024. With us today on the call are Helena Santos, Chief Executive Officer; Daniel Donaghy, CEO of SBI; and John Moore, Chairman. After the conclusion of today's prepared remarks, we will open—excuse me, pardon me—before we begin this call, I would like to remind all that except for the statements of historical fact, this conference may contain forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties, some of which are detailed under risk factors in documents filed by the company with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including the annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2024. Forward-looking statements speak only as of the date the statements were made.

Joe Diaz
Managing Partner at Lytham Partners

The company can give no assurance that such forward-looking statements will prove to be correct. Scientific Industries does not undertake and specifically disclaims any obligation to update any forward-looking statements except as required by law. Now, I'd like to turn the call over to Helena Santos, CEO of Scientific Industries. Helena?

Helena Santos
Helena Santos
CEO at Scientific Industries

Thank you, Joe, and thanks to our loyal shareholders for their continued support during this pivotal time for our company. Fiscal 2024 was a transformative year for us in several ways. First, we welcome two valuable board members, Mr. John Nicols. He's the former CEO of Nasdaq-listed Codexis, a synthetic biology company. Later, we welcome Mr. Michael Blackman. He's former President of a pharma process control provider named [ACC Inc]. Both John and Michael's expertise are valuable as we position our company for significant growth. Second, we streamlined our organization and improved operational efficiency. By doing that, we reduced operating expenses by nearly $3 million, and we cut cash used in operations by $2.5 million. Third, we launched a final hardware component of our VIVID pharmacy automation product line, the Workstation. This state-of-the-art pill counter integrates high-precision counting with powerful PC capabilities, helping pharmacies improve workflow and system integration.

Helena Santos
Helena Santos
CEO at Scientific Industries

Fourth, as Daniel Donaghy will discuss shortly right after me, SBI, or our bioprocessing segment, made significant strides in product development and commercialization, launching our DOTS MPS and the DO pills on time, and we entered fiscal 2025 with a strong pipeline of opportunities. Let me give a brief summary of our financial results for calendar year 2024. Starting with Benchtop laboratory equipment segment. Despite challenges in the lab equipment industry related to the stocking from the COVID inventory buildout and other economic factors, as we all know, our Genie product line sales were only 3.6% lower than the prior year. Regarding our TORBAL and our VIVID pill counter, we are optimistic about the future of our TORBAL business, particularly after overcoming industry cash flow challenges related to PBM rule changes in the independent pharmacy market.

Helena Santos
Helena Santos
CEO at Scientific Industries

Sales were down in the first half of 2024 but improved in the latter half. The recent launch of the VIVID Workstation is a potential game changer, offering not only superior pill counting but also pharmacy management functions in one space-saving unit. It's ideal for the growing telepharmacy market, the remote pharmacy operations market, and fulfilling state-imposed verification requirements. I'm happy to say that we've sold our first six Workstations through our exclusive U.S. distribution partner, Rx Systems, who is replacing the industry first mover Eyecon's product with our own VIVID pill counters. RX plans to replace the aging fleet of about 13,000 Eyecon units and to upsell to the targeted nearly 20,000 independent pharmacies currently using outdated manual or mechanical counting methods. This isn't even touching upon the bigger chains of about another 45,000 pharmacies.

Helena Santos
Helena Santos
CEO at Scientific Industries

We are very encouraged by the market reaction to the Workstation at our first few pharmacy trade shows of the year. Regarding our bioprocessing segment, Daniel will provide an overview of our high-growth bioprocessing operations right after me, which we are very excited about. As I look ahead for fiscal 2025, I believe we are poised for an exciting year, our TORBAL business expanding with multiple Workstation units in place, and we are preparing for the launch of a machine learning model by the end of fiscal 2025, positioning us at the forefront of automated pill counting. Our bioprocessing segment has strong momentum, especially with our shift towards the large mammalian cell culture market, which Daniel is going to speak about.

Helena Santos
Helena Santos
CEO at Scientific Industries

We will continue to be good stewards of our company's finances and make good investments to position us as a world-class bioprocessing company in years to come. With that, I'm going to turn it over to Mr. Donaghy to discuss our exciting bioprocessing business segment. Daniel?

Daniel Donaghy
CEO at Scientific Bioprocessing

Thanks, Helena, and hi everyone on the call. As we reflect on 2024, it's clear that the bioprocessing industry continues to operate in a uniquely complex environment. The aftershocks of the post-COVID inventory correction and a continued conservative capital allocation have led to slower than anticipated market recovery. Next to that, realities such as trade conflicts, as well as geopolitical tensions and uncertainties, have further disrupted supply chains, increased regulatory requirements, and prolonged procurement timelines. In Europe, economic growth was slow. Customers across the sector have remained cautious, and budget constraints have extended decision cycles. While in the U.S., many particularly research-driven players are currently deferring investments due to federal budget and grant freezes, as well as an unclear outlook for the scientific environment, whereby technology adoption has been somewhat slow and remains a bit difficult to predict.

Daniel Donaghy
CEO at Scientific Bioprocessing

However, we are also seeing careful signs of an approaching rebound and resurging optimism amongst leading industry players. According to McKinsey and others, the global bioprocessing and biomanufacturing tools market is projected to soon get back to double-digit annual growth, driven by biopharma markets like complex biologics or cell and gene therapies, synthetic biology expansions beyond into food, agriculture, and sustainable materials, as well as the emergence of R&D AI. In their recent earnings calls, giants like Sartorius, Danaher, or Thermo Fisher shared that they expect demand to recover in the second half of 2025 and into 2026, anticipate deferred investments to pick up, and highlight the convergence of digital tools and biology as a major driver of industry growth in the coming years. At Scientific Bioprocessing, we share this view.

Daniel Donaghy
CEO at Scientific Bioprocessing

While we recognize the current difficulties of the market environment in which we operate, we also know that as a scale-up, we are uniquely positioned to navigate these complex dynamics with speed, focus, and versatility, and turn them into new opportunities as much as our technology platform will be able to quickly shift to addressing new demands as well as towards bullish markets. In 2024, we continue to use the transitional market to advance our own transformation. In 2025, we are delivering the first integrated version of our bioprocessing platform, and we are convinced that by 2026, the business will be positioned to capitalize on the projected market rebound and the growing demands for digital real-time data and the next era of bioproduction. Let's dive into the business. Looking at our operative bioprocessing financials, I'm happy to report that overall, 2024 came in close with our reforecasted projection.

Daniel Donaghy
CEO at Scientific Bioprocessing

Sales compared to 2023 were up 24% at relatively stable growth margins and lower expenditures, which resulted in a net loss reduction of around $1 million. Furthermore, to account for longer technology adoption cycles and resulting slower-moving inventory, management conservatively decided to build $285,000 in reserves, which brought reported gross margins down to 58%. Taking that into account, operative gross margins across commercial deals already improved to plus 70%, particularly driven by the new platform, which highlights the value generation potential of the technology and helped SBI hit the original 2024 target for cash requirements. As shared during the last earnings call, product demand in Europe was notably weaker than historically usual until Q3, but saw an above-average seasonal year-end in Q4, whereby both the German entity and the U.S. entity exceeded their 2023 sales by 20% and 29%, respectively.

Daniel Donaghy
CEO at Scientific Bioprocessing

As such, Q4 2024 showed quarter-over-quarter growth of 23% and an increase of 31% compared to the same timeframe last year. On the cost side, Q4 saw an 11% year-over-year reduction in operating expenses. On a full-year basis, SBI has reduced costs by a total of $800,000, mainly driven by the company-wide cost efficiency program, which we executed during the first half of the year. Overall, 2024 was a continuation of the efforts that began with the change in leadership in 2022. During this time, SBI has developed into a much more productive organization, recording a 70% increase in sales and a reduction in operative expenses of almost 30%, which shows that the bioprocessing division is on the right path to achieve profitability and drive value. On the R&D side, we are on schedule with all major development tracks and have made significant advancements in key projects.

Daniel Donaghy
CEO at Scientific Bioprocessing

Most notably, 2024 saw us launching the first two key components of the DOTS platform with the market start of the multiparameter sensor and the sensor pills for dissolved oxygen. In parallel, proof of concept was achieved for the new pH sensor technology that is set to launch by the end of 2025 and the second-generation liquid injection system, which was conceptualized, both of which will play an important role in fulfilling the value proposition of our integrated platform. At the same time, we have taken on projects beyond our original roadmap.

Daniel Donaghy
CEO at Scientific Bioprocessing

Most notably, a miniaturized sensor for parallel bioreactor systems after our DOTS platform drew strong interest from key customers, leading to joint development and testing with major partners for a possible future roadmap edition. Next to that, we have generated a first proof of concept for nanoparticles as an alternative path for chemosensing in highly stress-sensitive cultures, as well as OTR vessels, so high-oxygen transfer vessels. What we did is completed successful external studies confirming earlier-than-expected applicability of our technology for mammalian cell cultures with both leading academic and industrial partners, which primed us to launch this technology into the cell culture market beginning of January 2025. On the commercial side, we entered 2024 with high expectations for the launch of our DOTS platform. In May, when we launched it, I'm proud to say that those expectations were really well met.

Daniel Donaghy
CEO at Scientific Bioprocessing

We closed the year with a 24% year-over-year sales growth. We recorded our strongest sales quarter to date with just below $600,000 revenue and had the strongest single month in sales with more than $300,000 in December. The newly launched DOTS platform has already made a major impact. Since its launch in May 2024, the platform contributed around 50% of revenues and quickly became the best-selling product group in the lineup. At the same time, we are extremely encouraged by the fact that 60% of orders came from industrial customers, as well as by the fact that large industry players like Merck and Sanofi are expanding their adoption of SBI's technologies. With revenue as a trailing indicator, we were particularly impressed by the strong and increasing market interest in our portfolio and then our vision as reflected in the pipeline as a leading indicator.

Daniel Donaghy
CEO at Scientific Bioprocessing

Throughout 2024, we generated 40% more leads than in the previous year and built a net new pipeline value of $2.6 million, representing a 94% year-over-year increase. As a result, we are entering 2025 with a robust starting pipeline of just below $4 million, which showcases the interest in the existing SBI portfolio but also reinforces the demand for the products under development like pH and the next-generation liquid injection system, which we will invest further into to drive pipeline growth. Looking ahead, we anticipate a continued recovery and innovation-focused investment while we remain mindful of the market volatility and short-term challenges, which we obviously closely monitor. Early 2025 may still reflect these pressures, particularly in grant-driven environments, but this does not reflect and affect our confidence for a soon-to-come recovery and a continuation of SBI's growth trajectory.

Daniel Donaghy
CEO at Scientific Bioprocessing

We remain highly optimistic that synthetic biology will not just come back strong but thrive. The ability to design and engineer biology at scale will be central to solving some of the world's most pressing challenges, from medicine to climate to sustainable manufacturing, but it will only be possible with a drastic reduction of the cost of failure in the scale-up from small-scale R&D to production capacities. This is precisely what SBI delivers. With that, I hand the call back to John.

John Moore
John Moore
Chairman at Scientific Industries

Thank you so much, Daniel. In conclusion, we've taken Scientific Industries, a 70-year-old mixing business with a great brand name, and we have built two businesses that are very poised right now to grow our sales, grow our margins, add substantial recurring revenue, and that are both going to hugely benefit from coming AI trends. We are excited to create new shareholder value. As Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple, says, "Innovation starts after the product launch." We think there's going to be continuous efforts now that we've made the bulk of the investment in TORBAL and the VIVID product line, as well as the Scientific Bioprocessing business, where we're going to be expanding product-market fit. We're going to be finding new end uses for the products. We're going to be adding exciting customers to our product line.

John Moore
John Moore
Chairman at Scientific Industries

We think this is going to be a transformational year for creating shareholder value. Thank you so much for listening to our year-end conference call. This concludes our prepared remarks.

Operator

The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.

Executives
    • John Moore
      John Moore
      Chairman
    • Helena Santos
      Helena Santos
      CEO
Analysts
    • Daniel Donaghy
      CEO at Scientific Bioprocessing
    • Joe Diaz
      Managing Partner at Lytham Partners
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