AbCellera's Q2 2026 revenue fell 76% to $4.1M and its net loss widened to $55.4M against a one-off-heavy prior year, while a $56M Jazz upfront lifted cash to $540M ahead of positive ABCL635 Phase 2 data and a $200M share sale.
Revenue
$4.0M
-76.3% YoY
Net income
-$55M
-59.6% YoY
Diluted EPS
$-0.18
-50.0% YoY
AbCellera's second quarter of 2026 looks worse on paper than it was in substance. Revenue fell 76% to $4.1 million and the net loss widened to $55.4 million, but both moves trace mostly to things that happened a year earlier: a one-time licensing payment that inflated Q2 2025 revenue, and a foreign-exchange gain that inflated Q2 2025 "other income." Operating costs were flat at $66.8 million. The bigger story sits on the balance sheet and in the weeks after the quarter: a $56 million upfront payment from Jazz Pharmaceuticals, a further $28 million from Vertex in July, positive Phase 2 data for its lead hot-flash drug ABCL635 in August, and a $200 million share sale two days later.
At a glance
$4.1M revenue (down 76%) — almost entirely the absence of $10.4 million of licensing revenue booked in Q2 2025; research-fee revenue alone fell from $6.6 million to $3.9 million.
$61.2M deferred revenue, up from $17.0M at year-end — cash partners have already paid for research AbCellera still has to do. It will be recognised as revenue over coming quarters, which is why management expects research-fee revenue to rise.
$540.1M in cash and marketable securities (over $565 million including restricted cash), before the $28 million Vertex upfront and roughly $200 million of gross offering proceeds that arrived after quarter-end.
Results in numbers
AbCellera is a clinical-stage biotech: it earns modest research fees and occasional licensing payments from partners who use its antibody-discovery platform, while spending heavily to develop its own drugs. Revenue and profit swing with partner deal timing, so cash and spending matter more than any single quarter's revenue line. All figures are in US dollars and GAAP (standard accounting rules); the company does not report adjusted earnings.
Metric
Q2 2026
Q2 2025
YoY Change
Total revenue
$4.1M
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An operating margin — the share of revenue left after running the business — is not meaningful here: operating costs were about 16 times revenue.
What drove the quarter
Revenue: a tough comparison, not a collapse in the business. The 10-Q attributes the $13.0 million drop to "licensing revenue recognized in the second quarter of 2025 and the timing and progress of our research and development efforts." Licensing and royalty revenue went from $10.4 million to $149,000. For the first half, revenue was $12.4 million versus $21.3 million, and research fees were actually slightly higher ($12.0 million vs $10.7 million).
R&D rose because two drugs are now in human trials. R&D climbed $6.8 million (17%). External clinical-trial costs were $5.1 million versus $0.8 million a year earlier, because ABCL635 and ABCL575 entered the clinic at the end of Q2 2025. Preclinical and discovery spending ($6.9 million) and R&D payroll ($22.2 million including stock-based pay) were flat.
Overhead fell sharply. Sales, general and administrative expense dropped 37%. Two causes, both named in the filing: headcount trimming (SG&A compensation fell from $11.3 million to $8.8 million) and lower legal costs ($10.7 million to $5.0 million for legal, software and other admin) after a legal settlement in December 2025 ended an expensive dispute.
Why the net loss widened more than the operating loss. Below the operating line, "interest and other" income fell from $9.5 million to roughly zero; the filing cites Canadian/US dollar exchange-rate swings, interest income and fair-value adjustments. That $9.6 million swing, plus the $13.0 million revenue gap, explains nearly all of the $20.7 million wider net loss. A larger income-tax recovery ($3.5 million vs $1.6 million, from carrying back losses to recover taxes paid earlier) partly offset it.
What the headline numbers hide
Cash burn looks far lower than it really is. Operating cash outflow for the first half was only $7.6 million, versus $44.0 million a year earlier. But the 10-Q says that figure includes the $56.0 million Jazz upfront and both $18 million instalments of a $36.0 million litigation settlement that was already recorded as income in 2025. Stripping out those two inflows, our own arithmetic puts underlying operating cash use near $100 million for the half, or about $50 million a quarter; part of that reflects a $16.6 million pay-down of payables and accrued liabilities, which should not repeat every half.
Receivables fell, deferred revenue rose — both favourable. Accounts receivable dropped from $58.3 million to $18.6 million as the settlement cash came in. Deferred revenue jumped to $61.2 million because Jazz paid up front for work not yet done; this is cash in hand ahead of the accounting revenue, the reverse of the usual warning sign.
One-offs sit in the prior year, not this one. Q2 2025 had $10.4 million of licensing revenue and a $9.5 million "other income" gain. Neither recurred, so the year-on-year deterioration overstates how much the underlying business worsened. Operating expenses were essentially unchanged.
No adjusted figures to reconcile. The company reports only GAAP results. Stock-based compensation, a real but non-cash cost, was $12.3 million this quarter versus $14.2 million a year earlier.
Loss per share was held down slightly by more shares. Weighted shares rose from 298.5 million to 305.6 million, and the August offering adds about 20.5 million more (17.4 million shares plus 3.1 million pre-funded warrants), roughly 6.7% dilution.
The partner pipeline shrank. Partner-led programs in which AbCellera holds a downstream stake — its right to future milestones and royalties — fell to 35 from 44 at the end of 2025. Twelve partner molecules are in clinical trials. The company is deliberately shifting towards its own drugs, so fewer partner programs is expected, but it also means less optionality from others' successes.
Guidance versus before. AbCellera gives no revenue or earnings guidance, only milestone timing and a funding statement. The funding statement is unchanged from Q1: current cash, marketable securities and government funding are expected to cover spending for "at least the next 36 months." The Q1 10-Q promised ABCL635 Phase 2 top-line data in Q3 2026; the Q2 filing narrowed that to August, and the company delivered on August 10. ABCL575's Phase 1 readout remains Q4 2026, with "no plans to pursue development past Phase 1."
Takeaway: Q2's weak revenue and wider loss are mostly a hard comparison against a one-time licensing payment and a currency gain a year ago; the quarter's real change is financial footing. Between the Jazz and Vertex upfronts ($84 million received so far), positive Phase 2 hot-flash data and a $200 million equity raise, AbCellera now has the cash to take ABCL635 into late-stage trials without leaning on partners — at the cost of about 7% more shares and a burn rate near $50 million a quarter that revenue does not come close to covering.
After the quarter: ABCL635 data and the equity raise
ABCL635 Phase 2 (August 10, 2026). ABCL635 is a once-monthly injection for moderate-to-severe hot flashes (vasomotor symptoms, or VMS) caused by menopause, working through the same brain receptor (NK3R) as the approved daily pills Veozah and Lynkuet. In a 92-woman placebo-controlled trial, according to the company's presentation (data cut-off July 30), after four weeks:
moderate-to-severe hot-flash frequency fell 83% on ABCL635 versus 33% on placebo, a difference of 5.3 fewer episodes per day;
severity fell 58% versus 12%;
84% of treated patients rated themselves "much" or "moderately" better, versus 27% on placebo;
no serious or severe adverse events in the ABCL635 group, and no liver or gastrointestinal safety signal; headache was more common on ABCL635 (28% vs 13%).
Caveats: this is a four-week result after a single dose in a small trial, and the company's comparison with Veozah and Lynkuet is across different trials, not head-to-head. Next steps named by the company are the 12-week follow-up to pick a dose and talks with regulators about late-stage development.
$200 million offering (priced August 12). AbCellera sold 17.4 million shares at $9.75 plus pre-funded warrants, for about $200 million before fees, to fund ABCL635's development and general purposes. Together with the $28 million Vertex upfront received in July, that is roughly $228 million of new cash on top of the $565 million-plus balance at June 30.
Outlook
Management's own milestones: ABCL635 12-week data and regulatory meetings, additional data at medical conferences later in 2026, and ABCL575 Phase 1 top-line data in Q4 2026. ABCL386 and ABCL688 remain in IND-enabling work (the studies required before a drug can enter human trials). The 10-Q expects research-fee revenue to rise as AbCellera works through the Jazz and Vertex upfronts, and Jazz owes another $28 million when a third program starts within 12 months.
Our read: revenue will stay small and lumpy, so the numbers to watch are the quarterly cash burn (about $50 million underlying in H1) and how fast deferred revenue turns into recognised research fees. With roughly $790 million of liquidity after the raise before third-quarter spending (our arithmetic: the $565 million-plus at June 30, the $28 million Vertex upfront and about $200 million gross from the offering), funding is not the constraint for the next few years; the stock's direction now hinges on whether ABCL635's 12-week data hold up the four-week efficacy and liver-safety picture, and how costly a Phase 3 program turns out to be. This is our first published analysis of AbCellera, so there is no earlier outlook to check against.