KeyBanc has reaffirmed a Sector Weight rating on Azenta, Inc. following its participation in the Society for Laboratory Automation and Screening 2026 Conference in Boston. The stock was trading at $28.62 and has declined 36.97% over the past year despite analyst price targets that span from $30 to $45.
Analyst Paul Knight described the conference as offering encouraging signals for the broader life science equipment and tools segment. Knight noted that companies supplying laboratory tools reported a weak capital expenditure environment in the prior year with indications of stabilization this year.
Azenta staged a pre-conference showcase on February 7 at its Boston biorepository facility. The event combined a bus tour of the site with a presentation focused on implementing laboratory automation, led by two subject-matter experts.
The showcase reached capacity: organizers reported more than 80 attendees representing global laboratories and biopharma firms, used two full charter buses to transport participants, and had to turn away additional interested guests because of space limits.
A focal point of the tour was the BioArc Ultra, a two-story automated storage unit capable of holding up to 16.9 million samples. Azenta says the system occupies about 75% less floor space than comparable manual freezer configurations and consumes roughly 72% less energy.
On a financial scale, Azenta has a market capitalization of $1.32 billion and annual revenue of $595 million. According to fair-value calculations cited in recent research, that combination of market cap and revenue suggests the stock may be undervalued; more detailed valuation and model work is available through subscription research services.
Azenta's Q1 2026 results presented a mixed operational picture. The company reported earnings per share of $0.09, missing the consensus forecast of $0.14, while producing revenue of $148.64 million, slightly above the $146.94 million estimate. The earnings miss was attributed in part to a decline in gross margins, which fell by 360 basis points year-over-year.
Responding to those results and the margin contraction, TD Cowen lowered its price target for Azenta to $30 from $39 and maintained a Hold rating, citing the ongoing margin pressure as a primary concern.
Separately, Azenta expanded its strategic partnerships by collaborating with Frontier Space on a project to support space research. The partnership included participation in the EGGS-2 mission, which tested Frontier's SpaceLab Mk 2 platform in microgravity. The mission, launched in January 2026, used Azenta's FluidX 0.26mL tubes for 42 experimental samples.
These recent events underscore a company managing competing forces: tangible market and customer interest in its automation and storage solutions, alongside near-term financial headwinds tied to margins. The sold-out facility tour and product demonstration indicate demand-side engagement, while the quarterly results and analyst adjustments illustrate investor sensitivity to margin dynamics.
Investors and market watchers will likely weigh the operational momentum shown at the Boston showcase and the strategic optics of space-related work against the immediate earnings and margin trends that prompted a trimmed price target from TD Cowen.