Analysts downgrade Beta Bionics on new patient starts miss

 Analysts downgraded Beta Bionics (Nasdaq:BBNX) to “Neutral” following preliminary fourth-quarter results that fell shy of expectations.

Shares of BBNX fell 35% to $20.86 apiece in early-morning trading today.

Beta Bionics, which has completed its first full year as a public company following its IPO last year, pre-announced fourth-quarter revenues of $32 million. That came in ahead of projections for $28.9 million in sales and marked a 56% year-over-year increase. The company expects its installed customer base to reach at least 35,000 users, marking an uptick of at least 128%. compared to the same period a year ago.

However, the company reports expectations for at least 5,581 new patient starts for its iLet automated insulin delivery system. While that represents a 36% increase from last year, BofA analyst Travis Steed wrote in a report that this tally comes in 4% shy of Wall Street projections. Steed said analysts expected more momentum in new patient starts amid an “increasingly competitive” market.

“The bar for sustained upside becomes even more paramount without profitability,” Steed wrote.

Steed notes that Beta Bionics described its fourth-quarter performance as strong as more diabetes companies move into the pharmacy. The company also has effective formulary agreements in place with all major pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) in the U.S. as of July.

Beta Bionics didn’t expand its sales force in the recent quarter, and the analyst says that new reps “would have provided more upside.” However, the company isn’t seeing anything different on the competitive front, and Steed saw nothing concrete in the market that would have led to softness.

Meanwhile, the company looks poised to add further competition to the space with its planned “Mint” patch pump in development. The company has eyes on a 2027 launch for the patch pump.

“The market is increasingly competitive and [Beta Bionics] is going to have to prove its ability to execute against larger/more scaled competitors,” Steed said. “We acknowledge the patch pump expected in 2027 supports the long term-thesis and should be a catalyst for the stock and likely accelerates new patient starts but the Q4 update makes it more difficult to see as much upside until the patch is available.”

https://www.drugdeliverybusiness.com/analysts-downgrade-beta-bionics-new-patient-starts-miss/