Illumina Q4 Profit Surges, Results Beat View; But Outlook Below Estimates

(RTTNews) - Biotechnology company Illumina Inc. (ILMN) on Tuesday reported a 90 percent surge in profit for the fourth quarter from last year, reflecting strong revenue growth and margins.

Both revenue and adjusted earnings per share for the quarter beat analysts' expectations. However, the company forecast financial results for fiscal 2015 below Street estimates.

Jay Flatley, CEO of Illumina said, "We delivered record fourth quarter and fiscal year 2014 financial results which greatly exceeded our expectations. Our focus on technology innovation, as evidenced by the launch of HiSeq X Ten, which enables the $1,000 genome, and the NextSeq 500, were major contributors to our outperformance."

San Diego, California-based Illumina's fourth-quarter net income was $153.28 million or $1.03 per share, up from $80.66 million or $0.56 per share in the previous-year quarter.

Adjusted earnings for the quarter were $0.87 per share, compared to $0.45 per share in the year-ago period. On average, twenty four analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected the company to earn $0.78 per share for the quarter. Analysts' estimates typically exclude special items.

Revenues for the quarter grew 32 percent to $512.4 million from $387.3 million in the same period last year. Analysts had a consensus revenue estimate of $507.65 million for the quarter.

Gross margin for the quarter expanded to 75.1 percent from 66.9 percent in the prior-year period.

For fiscal 2014, Illumina's net income rose to $353.35 million or $2.37 per share from $125.31 million or $0.90 per share in the prior year. Adjusted earnings for the year were $2.74 per share, compared to $1.80 per share last year.

Revenue for the year grew 31 percent to $1.86 billion from $1.42 billion in the previous year.

Street expected the company to earn $2.65 per share for the year on revenues of $1.86 billion.

Looking ahead to fiscal year 2015, Illumina forecasts adjusted earnings of $3.12 to $3.18 per share and about 20 percent revenue growth. Analysts currently expect the company to report earnings of $3.20 per share on revenue growth of 22 percent to $2.26 billion.

Flatley said, "The recently announced HiSeq X Five, HiSeq 3000/4000 and NextSeq 550 instruments further enhance the most extensive sequencing portfolio available, and will position us for continued long-term growth as we develop and address the large and nascent market opportunities ahead of us."

ILMN closed Tuesday's regular trading at $203.25, up $1.57 or 0.78 percent on a volume of 1.66 million shares. However, in after-hours, the stock declined $0.50 or 0.25 percent to $202.75.