BioNTech has experienced a significant shift in its financial standing, reporting a net loss of €315.1m ($339.3m) in the first quarter (Q1) of 2024.
This contrasts with the net profit of €502.2m recorded during the same period of the previous year.
For the three months ended 31 March 2024, the company’s loss per share stood at €1.31, down from diluted earnings per share of €2.05 in the same quarter of 2023.
Total revenues for BioNTech in Q1 2024 were €187.6m, a substantial decrease from the €1.27bn reported in Q1 2023.
The primary cause for the downturn is the reduced commercial revenues from the sales of the company’s Covid-19 vaccine, as demand settles to an endemic level globally.
The company’s cost of sales also saw a decline, coming in at €59.1m for Q1 2024 compared to €96m in Q1 2023.
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By GlobalData
This change is primarily due to the lower costs associated with decreased sales of the Covid-19 vaccine.
These figures include the share of gross profit owed to collaboration partner Pfizer, as well as royalty expenses based on BioNTech’s sales.
Additionally, the cost of sales was impacted by expenses related to inventory write-offs and the destruction of inventory.
Q1 2024 research and development expenses, however, increased to €507.5m from €334m in Q1 2023 reflecting the company’s continued investment in innovation and development.
BioNTech CEO and co-founder prof Ugur Sahin stated: “In the past weeks, we have reported positive preliminary data for both our individualised and off-the-shelf mRNA-based candidates which further underline the potential of our iNeST and FixVac platforms. We look forward to providing more updates this year across our oncology portfolio, including our bispecific antibody and ADC programmes.
“In the remainder of the year, we plan to develop and commercialise a variant-adapted Covid-19 vaccine and accelerate our clinical development activities towards realising the full potential of our oncology pipeline with a view to becoming a commercial company with marketed medicines for cancer and infectious diseases.”
Despite the downturn in the first quarter, BioNTech maintains its financial outlook for the full year of 2024. The company anticipates group revenues to range between €2.5bn and €3.1bn for the financial year.
In February 2024, BioNTech entered a strategic partnership with Autolus Therapeutics to progress the development of its autologous chimeric antigen receptor cell therapy programmes.