Bruker (BRKR) Morgan Stanley 24th Annual Global Healthcare Conference summary

Industry trends and scientific inflection points

• Biology and disease biology are at an inflection point, with only about 20-25% of disease biology understood, highlighting the need for deeper insights beyond genomics into proteomics, metabolomics, and spatial biology.

• Multi-omics, spatial interactions, and protein dynamics are crucial for advancing drug discovery and diagnostics, with AI as a foundational tool to manage complexity and accelerate insights.

• The next 5-10 years are seen as a major growth opportunity, driven by the need for advanced tools to address biological complexity and improve drug discovery success rates.

• Integration of technologies like NMR, mass spectrometry, Cryo-EM, and AI is enabling a deeper understanding of disease mechanisms and biomarker discovery.

Business performance and market dynamics

• Experienced rapid growth post-COVID through 2024, followed by headwinds in 2025 from currency, tariffs, and academic spending, with recovery underway in 2026.

• Non-life science deep tech, including defense and energy, is the fastest-growing and high-margin segment, contributing around $700 million in revenue.

• Strong order growth in China and outside the U.S. for academic/government research, with anticipated boosts from NIH and NSF funding in the U.S.

• Semiconductor metrology and advanced packaging for AI and high-performance computing are significant contributors to growth, with analysts increasingly recognizing this segment.

Strategic focus and innovation

• Business pillars include deep tech, diagnostics, and systems biology, all leveraging a shared technology base for applications in life sciences, semiconductors, and diagnostics.

• Recent acquisitions, such as Mimetas, strengthen capabilities in humanized microphysiological systems (organs-on-a-chip), supporting next-generation drug discovery.

• Focus on expanding aftermarket and consumables, aiming for a 50/50 split with instruments as diagnostics and spatial biology grow.

• Innovation is increasingly driven by customer needs and the pursuit of deeper functional information, leading to unique, high-margin solutions.