AbCellera Biologics Inc (NASDAQ: ABCL) stock fell over 7% on 14th May, 2021 (Source: Google finance) after the company in the first quarter of FY 21 has reported the net earnings of $117.2 million, compared to a net loss of $2.1 million in Q1 2020.
The company has reported the revenue in the quarter of nearly $203 million, up from $4.7 million in Q1 2020, which id 44 times what it was in Q1 2020. The company had significant royalties and a milestone payment from bamlanivimab in the results that were not present in the first quarter of 2020. The company has achieved royalty revenues of $171 million and a milestone payment of $7 million in Q1 for first sales in Europe. These are all attributable to the Lilly sales of bamlanivimab, both alone and in combination with etesevimab. Licensing revenue of $20.3 million is a new line on the income statement and originated from the recently acquired Trianni humanized rodent platform. The partnership business produced research fees of $4.0 million, which is $0.7 million less than in Q1 2020.
The milestone bamlanivimab reached in Q1 was the first commercial sale in Europe. Directly attributable to the $171 million in royalty revenue, the firm earned from Lilly sales of bamlanivimab were $20 million in royalty fees payable to the NIH. The net impact of royalties on income from operations during the quarter was, therefore, $151 million.
Moreover, the company incurred research and development expenses in the first quarter of approximately $12 million, which is a threefold increase over the previous year. The company expects that the investment into R&D to continue to grow as the company is expanding the R&D team’s capabilities and capacity. This allows the company to deliver on our partner programs, as well as to enhance the technology stack organically. In sales and marketing, expenses for the first quarter were about $3 million, which is an almost sixfold increase from the same quarter in 2020. This expense also includes an $800,000 donation to fund the clinical study related to bamlanivimab in Canada. In general and administration expenses for the quarter, they were about $6 million, also a significant increase from 2020, driven by the need to support a much larger business and meet the requirements of being a publicly listed company. The company has ended the quarter with $686 million of cash and cash equivalents and $193 million of accrued accounts receivable.