BNGO August 10, 2026

Bionano Genomics Q2 2026 Earnings Call - Record Consumable Sales Signal Clinical Adoption Momentum

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Summary

Bionano Genomics delivered a robust second quarter in 2026, reporting $8.2 million in revenue, a 21% year-over-year increase that surpassed guidance. The growth engine is clearly visible in consumable sales, which jumped 30% to $4.3 million, driven by a record 27% rise in nanochannel array flow cell units sold. This surge reflects a strategic pivot toward deepening utilization among existing routine users rather than chasing new installed base expansion. The company’s gross margin expanded to a record 53%, supported by operational efficiencies and a favorable mix shift toward recurring consumable revenue. International markets now constitute the majority of total revenue, underscoring the global traction of optical genome mapping (OGM) in leading European institutions.

Key Takeaways

  • Q2 2026 revenue reached $8.2 million, up 21% year-over-year, beating the upper end of the previous guidance range of $7.5 million to $7.8 million.
  • Consumable revenue surged 30% to $4.3 million, driven by a record 27% year-over-year increase in nanochannel array flow cell sales, totaling 9,219 units.
  • Gross margin hit a quarterly record of 53%, up from 52% in Q2 2025, reflecting improved operational efficiency and a shift toward higher-margin recurring revenue.
  • Adjusted operating expenses remained flat at $8.7 million, down slightly from $8.8 million in the prior year period, demonstrating disciplined cost management.
  • The company fully retired its outstanding senior secured convertible debt, simplifying its balance sheet and removing a significant financial overhang.
  • Cash and equivalents stood at $10.4 million, providing a runway extending into at least the first quarter of 2027, even with ongoing supply constraints.
  • Revenue growth is primarily driven by increased utilization and clinical adoption among existing customers, not new system installations, validating the strategy to focus on routine users.
  • International revenue now represents the majority of total revenue, highlighting strong adoption momentum at leading healthcare institutions across Europe.
  • Full-year 2026 revenue guidance was raised, with the low end increased to $31 million to $33 million, representing 9% to 16% growth over 2025.
  • Two Category 1 CPT codes for OGM in hematology and constitutional disorders are actively translating into clinical adoption and revenue, particularly in the U.S. and Europe.

Full Transcript

Conference Operator: Good day, and welcome to the Bionano second quarter 2026 earnings conference call. Today’s conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Webb Campbell from Gilmartin Group. Please go ahead.

Webb Campbell, IR Representative, Gilmartin Group: Thank you, operator, and good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to the Bionano second quarter 2026 financial results conference call. On the call today are Dr. Albert Luderer, Chairman and Interim CEO of Bionano, and Mark Adamchak, Bionano’s Vice President of Accounting and Principal Accounting Officer. After market close today, Bionano issued a press release announcing its financial results for the second quarter 2026. A copy of the release can be found on the investor relations page of the company’s website. Certain statements made during this conference call may be forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ materially from such statements due to several factors and risks, some of which are identified in Bionano’s press release and Bionano’s report filed with the SEC. These forward-looking statements are based upon information available to Bionano today, August 10, 2026, and the company assumes no obligation to update statements as circumstances change.

During our call, we may reference certain non-GAAP financial measures which we believe provide useful information for investors. Reconciliations of these measures to GAAP can be found on our press release and slide deck. An audio recording and webcast replay of today’s conference call will also be available online on the investor relations page of the company website. With that, I will turn the call over to Al.

Dr. Albert Luderer, Chairman and Interim CEO, Bionano Genomics: Well, thank you, Webb, and good afternoon, everyone. I am pleased to be here with you all today to share our second quarter 2026 results. Bionano had a strong second quarter, and that strength can be directly attributed to increased adoption by our customers. Our results reflect a vote of confidence from our routine use customer community and the accelerating global adoption of optical genome mapping, or OGM. Importantly, the growth of our consumable sales this quarter was primarily driven by increased clinical adoption. We expect that adoption, together with increased utilization at existing and new clinical sites, to remain the foundation of our growth. Before I get into the quarter, I want to note an important addition to our team. We are pleased to welcome back Dr. Alex Hastie as our Chief Scientific Officer. Alex was one of the original architects of our technology.

He spent 14 years building Bionano’s leadership in OGM, and he’s widely regarded across our community as, and I quote, "Mr. Optical Genome Mapping." His return underscores our commitment to scientific leadership as we expand the commercial and clinical research applications of our platform. I also wanted to provide a very brief update on the ongoing search for my replacement. I’m working in lockstep with the board to identify the best candidate to take Bionano into its next stage of growth. Until then, I remain solely committed to Bionano, our customers, employees, and our shareholders. As a reminder, our focus remains on transforming pathology, the discipline that investigates the causes, developments, and effects of disease. Legacy analog workflows are tedious, slow, costly, and labor-intensive. We are spearheading a shift to streamlined digital workflows built on technology and platform consolidation, automation, and the AI-driven software behind our products and solutions.

Today, I’ll walk through the progress we’re making against our strategy to transform pathology. I want to briefly recap the framework that continues to guide our execution. Beginning in September 2024, we deliberately redirected our focus away from aggressive installed base expansion towards driving profitable growth with existing routine users. We are achieving this by being selective about new customer acquisition, prioritizing prospects most likely to become routine, high-volume users. Four strategic pillars define how we have and will continue to execute against that framework. First, to support and sustain our installed base of routine OGM and VIA software users. Second, to increase OGM utilization by routine users by supporting menu expansion and improving ease of use with VIA and Ionic adoption. Third, to build the support needed for OGM reimbursement and inclusion in medical society guidelines and recommendations.

Fourth, to improve profitability and scalability through lower costs, higher volumes, and continuous improvement in product quality. Turning to our first and second pillars, which are focused on supporting our installed base and driving greater utilization of our products, Q2 2026 nanochannel array flow cells sold were up 27% year-over-year at a record 9,219 units. Demand continues to outpace our supply, although we are making progress working down our backlog. Removing nanochannel array flow cells tied to sales of new OGM systems in both periods, nanochannel array flow cells sold to existing customers were up 24% year-over-year in Q2. Simply put, our customers are running more samples, and much of that pull-through reflects increasing clinical adoption of OGM. Breaking down our revenue segments, consumable revenue was $4.3 million in Q2 2026, up 30% year-over-year.

That growth came primarily from an increase in the number of nanochannel array flow cells sold, consistent with the clinical adoption trend I just mentioned, the clearest evidence of our strategy in action. Software revenue was $1.4 million in Q2, down 16% year-over-year, reflecting timing delays in deployment from certain customers. Other revenue, which includes instruments and services, was $2.5 million in Q2 2026, up 38% year-over-year, led by higher instrument sales as new customers came onto the platform. This ongoing shift towards a higher proportion of recurring consumable-led revenue reflects a healthier, more predictable business mix in our view, and is directly aligned with our strategy. I’d also note that the international markets continue to be a key growth driver in the quarter, with international revenue now representing the majority of our total revenue. We attribute this to broadening clinical adoption at leading European institutions.

Regarding our second pillar, driving greater utilization of our products, we ended the quarter with 397 OGM systems installed worldwide, up 5% from 378 a year ago. At the same time, flow cells sold were up 27% year-over-year at 9,219 units, a record for any quarter, even as demand continues to outpace what we can currently supply. Together, these two data points capture exactly what we’re focused on, meaningfully deepening flow cell utilization within a robust footprint of OGM systems. Expanding on the second pillar, increasing OGM utilization by supporting software adoption and menu expansion, we continue to receive very positive feedback on our software and compute upgrades, which enable customers to expand their menus and increase utilization, in some cases, doubling weekly cancer sample throughput without any hardware change. VIA’s reach extends well beyond OGM.

It remains the gold standard for CNV analysis on microarrays, and adoption among NGS and long-read sequencing labs continues to grow. These non-OGM VIA users represent both a durable software revenue stream and a natural entry point into broader Bionano adoption. We also continue to develop and support our Ionic system, which represents a fundamentally different approach to nucleic acid purification. Rather than relying on the bead and column-based binding and washing steps that have defined the space for the last two decades, Ionic separates and concentrates DNA and RNA directly in solution. We are specifically expanding Ionic capabilities to interface directly with sample preparation for OGM and long-read sequencing, with the OGM expansion targeted for launch in Q4 2026.

In our view, it will be an important contributor to incremental consumables revenue and deeper customer relationships, supporting the higher-margin recurring revenue mix at the center of our long-term growth strategy. Now, regarding the third pillar, building support for OGM reimbursement and inclusion in medical society guidelines, the two category 1 CPT codes that took effect earlier this year, covering OGM and hematologic malignancies at $1,853.22 and OGM and constitutional genetic disorders at $1,263.53, now cover OGM’s primary application areas and represent significant reimbursement infrastructure supporting routine adoption. What we are increasingly seeing this year is reimbursement infrastructure translating into real clinical adoption and utilization, which is, of course, the engine behind our consumable growth. This development continues to reduce barriers to adoption and pave the way for even more routine use of OGM across oncology and clinical genetic research communities globally.

On the publications and evidence front, momentum continues in the second quarter, and the evidence base is increasingly clinical in nature. First, in May, we announced the largest OGM study of T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia, or T-ALL, to date, published in Modern Pathology and conducted by researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center and Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Across 91 cases, OGM detected genomic abnormalities in 97.8% of cases, compared to just 55% by conventional karyotyping, and delivered clinically relevant genomic information beyond karyotyping in approximately 70% of cases, all from a single workflow. T-ALL is an aggressive blood cancer where roughly half of cases remain unsolved by legacy methods, and this study demonstrates how well-suited OGM is to that challenge.

Second, we announced multiple 2026 publications describing the unique utility of OGM in reproductive health and prenatal genetic disorders, with 13 studies analyzing 730 subjects published to date, an important expansion of OGM’s evidence base into a large new application area. Third, at the 2026 European Society of Human Genetics Conference, or ESHG, studies featuring OGM increased 67% year-over-year, with authorship spanning 17 countries, up from 12 in 2025, a strong signal of the global breadth of the OGM research community. These studies join landmark multiple myeloma studies from Johns Hopkins and MD Anderson Cancer Center, published in the American Journal of Hematology, which we highlighted last quarter and which demonstrated that OGM can significantly outperform traditional methods for detecting structural variations and chromosomal abnormalities. Taken together, we believe this expanding, increasingly clinical body of evidence is a leading indicator of future adoption and utilization of OGM.

Regarding our fourth pillar, we’re pleased to report progress on our goal to reach profitability. From a high 20% gross margin profile in 2023, we’ve steadily driven that figure higher over the past several years, reaching 53% in Q2 2026, our highest quarterly gross margin to date. We have reduced operating expenses with the same disciplined philosophy. As revenue scales and our mix continues to tilt towards higher margin consumables and software, we expect these trends to carry us towards adjusted EBITDA breakeven over time, a key milestone we’re focused on as we build towards sustainable profitability. Additionally, I’m happy to share that in the second quarter, we fully retired our outstanding senior secured convertible debt, further simplifying our financial profile.

I’ll now turn the call over to Mark Adamchak, our Principal Accounting Officer, to review our Q2 2026 financial highlights and discuss our expectations for Q3 and the full year 2026. Mark?

Mark Adamchak, Vice President of Accounting and Principal Accounting Officer, Bionano Genomics: Thanks, Al. Revenue for the second quarter of 2026 is $8.2 million, up 21% compared to Q2 2025 and above our guidance range of $7.5 million-$7.8 million. We sold 9,219 nanochannel array flow cells, up 27% compared to Q2 2025, despite ongoing supply constraints as consumable demand continued to outpace our current manufacturing capacity. Turning to profitability, adjusted gross margin for the second quarter of 2026 was 53%, compared to 52% in Q2 2025, reflecting continued operational efficiencies under our strategy. Second quarter 2026 adjusted operating expense was $8.7 million, compared to $8.8 million in Q2 2025. We ended the quarter with $10.4 million in cash equivalent and available for sale securities, including a half million subject to certain restrictions. Based on factors described in our Form 10-Q, we expect our cash runway to extend into at least the first quarter of 2027.

We also note that during the second quarter, we completed the full retirement of our outstanding senior secured convertible debt, which marks a meaningful balance sheet milestone that further simplifies our financial profile. Building on this progress, we expect revenue to grow throughout the year as we continue executing on our plan. For the full year 2026, we are raising the low end of our revenue guidance range to $31 million-$33 million, representing growth of 9%-16% over 2025. For Q3 2026, we are initiating guidance of $8.2 million-$8.6 million, representing 11%-16% growth over Q3 2025. We are very excited about the work and the journey ahead of us at Bionano. With that, I’ll turn the call back to the operator for Q&A.

Conference Operator: Certainly. As a reminder, to ask a question, please press 11 again. Please stand by while we compile our Q&A roster. Our first question will be coming from the line of Yi Chen of H.C. Wainwright & Co.. Your line is open, Yi.

Yi Chen, Analyst, H.C. Wainwright & Co.: Hi, thank you for taking my questions. You mentioned that you are raising the lower end of the revenue guidance for 2026. Could you tell us why the higher end is not raised as well?

Dr. Albert Luderer, Chairman and Interim CEO, Bionano Genomics: Thank you for the question. Yeah, we’re very much constrained in terms of our nanochannel array flow cells manufacturing capacity. As we mentioned in the call earlier, we are in back order and hope to remedy that by the end or at least the middle to the end of the fourth quarter coming up. So we’re reluctant to raise the top line until we know for certain that our manufacturing can keep up with demand.

Yi Chen, Analyst, H.C. Wainwright & Co.: I see. Your guidance for the third quarter could be essentially flat compared to the second quarter or maybe a small sequential growth, while your second quarter demonstrated a pretty robust sequential growth over the first quarter. Is there a seasonality involved or is it also this issue related to manufacturing?

Dr. Albert Luderer, Chairman and Interim CEO, Bionano Genomics: It’s actually caused by several very large orders that are very close to the end of the third quarter, and we thought they were at risk, so we were conservative in our outlook towards whether we would close them this quarter or next quarter.

Yi Chen, Analyst, H.C. Wainwright & Co.: Okay, got it. Lastly, could you maybe give us some additional color regarding whether the current growth observed in the second quarter is primarily driven by increased utilization within the existing clients or new clients that acquired during the quarter?

Dr. Albert Luderer, Chairman and Interim CEO, Bionano Genomics: The majority of our growth is coming from existing clients. It’s very strong demand with especially our clinical users.

That’s where the majority of the growth is coming from.

Yi Chen, Analyst, H.C. Wainwright & Co.: Do you expect the same for the coming quarters, that the majority of growth will be coming from existing clients?

Dr. Albert Luderer, Chairman and Interim CEO, Bionano Genomics: Yes, I believe that will be the case. There’s tremendous demand, and we’re looking forward to meeting that demand.

Yi Chen, Analyst, H.C. Wainwright & Co.: Okay, got it. Thank you.

Dr. Albert Luderer, Chairman and Interim CEO, Bionano Genomics: Thank you, Yi.

Conference Operator: Our next question will be coming from the line of Jason McCarthy of Maxim Group. Your line is open, Jason.

Michael Okunewitch, Analyst, Maxim Group: Hey, guys. This is Michael Okunewitch on the line. Thank you so much for taking my questions today.

Dr. Albert Luderer, Chairman and Interim CEO, Bionano Genomics: Hey, Michael.

Michael Okunewitch, Analyst, Maxim Group: I guess just to start things off, I wanted to see if any of the growth you’ve seen in consumables unit place shipments or in terms of revenue, has been driven by the new pricing on the CPT code in hematology, or if we’re still expecting that to take some more time to materialize.

Dr. Albert Luderer, Chairman and Interim CEO, Bionano Genomics: That’s a great question. Right now, we think it is starting to drive the sales, and only time will tell if that’s factual or not. But we believe it’s true here in the States. We also see that trend occurring in Europe, where different regions are starting to gain coverage. So it’s a big deal.

Michael Okunewitch, Analyst, Maxim Group: All right. Then in terms of the constitutional genetics application, are there any efforts ongoing to get reimbursement to reach a similar level to Heme’s? Because I believe that’s still the same level that Heme’s used to be at before you got the improved CPT code pricing.

Dr. Albert Luderer, Chairman and Interim CEO, Bionano Genomics: Yes, that’s correct. There was some effort, I believe, to alter that, but I don’t think there’s been any progress with regards to that.

Michael Okunewitch, Analyst, Maxim Group: All right. Then just one last one, a little bit of a just financial-related question. It does seem like looking at the sequential growth, the number of consumables sold during the quarter seems to have quite significantly outpaced the change in consumables revenue, at least on a sequential basis between the first quarter and second quarter. Could you just help provide a little bit of context on what’s driving that?

Dr. Albert Luderer, Chairman and Interim CEO, Bionano Genomics: Marc, you want to take a shot at that?

Mark Adamchak, Vice President of Accounting and Principal Accounting Officer, Bionano Genomics: Yeah, you have to remember that we have a substantial portion of our customers that are on a reagent rental. It’s not a one-to-one ratio of flow cells sold to revenue dollars in. A portion of that gets deferred and amortized over the life of that lease. That’s primarily the difference between the growth.

Michael Okunewitch, Analyst, Maxim Group: All right. Well, thank you very much. I appreciate the additional color and congrats on the great progress you guys are making.

Dr. Albert Luderer, Chairman and Interim CEO, Bionano Genomics: Thank you for your questions, Michael.

Conference Operator: This concludes today’s conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.

Dr. Albert Luderer, Chairman and Interim CEO, Bionano Genomics: Thank you.