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Ginkgo Bioworks Holdings, Inc.: Q3 FY2026 earnings call

What management said about Q3 FY2026, from the documents filed with the SEC on 5 November 2026: press release. Guidance figures: 1 kept. The quarter’s numbers.

Key takeaways

  • Revenue fell 6% year over year: Third quarter revenue was $27.7 million, against $29.4 million a year earlier, and up from $20.2 million in the second quarter of 2026. Source
  • Net loss from continuing operations narrowed: Net loss from continuing operations was $41.0 million, against $73.4 million a year earlier. Loss before income taxes was $41.3 million. Source
  • Adjusted EBITDA loss narrowed to $22 million: Adjusted EBITDA was a loss of $22 million for the quarter, compared with a loss of $53 million in the comparable prior year period. Source
  • Quarterly cash burn was $27 million: The company reported third quarter cash burn of $27 million, which is the measure behind the full-year cash burn range. Source
  • University lab commissions cited: Caltech, University of Maryland and Northwestern have commissioned Ginkgo-built labs under the NSF PCL Test Bed, and MIT Media Lab is building a RAC-based cloud lab. Source
  • 22 ADME customers signed in Q3: The company reports 22 ADME customers signed in the third quarter, 20 of them first-time Ginkgo customers, for the ADME-One service. Source
  • R&D spend fell sharply year on year: Research and development expense was $40.9 million, against $69.4 million a year earlier; nine-month expense was $137.1 million against $193.6 million. Source
  • Cash and securities declined to $285M: Cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities were $285 million at September 30, 2026, down from $302 million at June 30, 2026. Source

“Ginkgo now has two core offerings built on one autonomous lab platform,”

Jason Kelly, Co-founder and CEO of Ginkgo Bioworks

Guidance

AreaPeriodFigureAgainst last quarter
Cash burn SourceFull year 2026($150)-($125) millionKept

What changed from last quarter

  • New: The company announced the sale of an autonomous lab to Novo, described as a top-tier pharma company, for Novo's new Waltham, Massachusetts R&D site. Source
  • New: A subcontract worth up to $17.5 million under ARPA-H GIVE, to put RACs and Catalyst into RNA-medicine manufacturing for the first time. Source
  • New: Takeda, Argenx, Lundbeck and AbbVie founded an Antibody Developability Consortium, and GSK, Novartis and Biogen signed new work; the prior release did not report these. Source

Quarterly results and growth drivers

  • Revenue fell 6% year over year: Third quarter revenue was $27.7 million, against $29.4 million a year earlier, and up from $20.2 million in the second quarter of 2026. Source
  • Net loss from continuing operations narrowed: Net loss from continuing operations was $41.0 million, against $73.4 million a year earlier. Loss before income taxes was $41.3 million. Source
  • Adjusted EBITDA loss narrowed to $22 million: Adjusted EBITDA was a loss of $22 million for the quarter, compared with a loss of $53 million in the comparable prior year period. Source
  • Quarterly cash burn was $27 million: The company reported third quarter cash burn of $27 million, which is the measure behind the full-year cash burn range. Source

Offerings and platform

  • Autonomous Labs Equipment sales: The company sells RAC and Catalyst systems to pharma, national labs, universities and the U.S. government, as described in the release. Source
  • Nebula run as the Cloud Lab: Nebula is described as the world's largest autonomous lab, with more than 100 reconfigurable automation carts (RACs) running experiments for the Cloud Lab. Source
  • Cloud Lab delivers data to pharma and AI: The Cloud Lab delivers ADME, DRUG-seq and antibody data to pharma, and AI training data to frontier labs and techbio companies. Source

“With the U.S. government now treating autonomous labs as national infrastructure, we believe Ginkgo is well positioned to lead the transition from the bench to autonomous research.”

Jason Kelly, Co-founder and CEO of Ginkgo Bioworks

Government and university autonomous labs

  • University lab commissions cited: Caltech, University of Maryland and Northwestern have commissioned Ginkgo-built labs under the NSF PCL Test Bed, and MIT Media Lab is building a RAC-based cloud lab. Source
  • Federal programs cited as tailwinds: The company cites the Genesis Mission, the NSF's roughly $400 million PCL Test Bed and the $1.5 billion X-Labs initiative as federal moves toward autonomous lab infrastructure. Source
  • Nebula access under X-Labs: The company says it provides access to Nebula under the X-Labs initiative, as the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy announced on October 8. Source

Cloud Lab customers and AI data

  • 22 ADME customers signed in Q3: The company reports 22 ADME customers signed in the third quarter, 20 of them first-time Ginkgo customers, for the ADME-One service. Source
  • ADME-One price comparison restated: ADME-One is described as orders of magnitude cheaper than WuXi, with work done in Boston; the prior release had said cheaper than WuXi by 10X. Source
  • Frontier AI labs use the Cloud Lab: Frontier AI labs, named as OpenAI, use the Cloud Lab for AI data generation, according to the release. Source

“giving pharma an onshore alternative to overseas CROs and giving frontier AI labs a new engine for training data.”

Jason Kelly, Co-founder and CEO of Ginkgo Bioworks

Costs and operating expenses

  • R&D spend fell sharply year on year: Research and development expense was $40.9 million, against $69.4 million a year earlier; nine-month expense was $137.1 million against $193.6 million. Source
  • Excess space cost in G&A: General and administrative expense was $28.6 million, against $37.0 million; carrying cost of excess space, net of sublease income, was $14.0 million in the quarter. Source
  • Operating loss narrowed: Loss from operations was $43.6 million, against $82.3 million a year earlier. Source

Cash, balance sheet and capital

  • Cash and securities declined to $285M: Cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities were $285 million at September 30, 2026, down from $302 million at June 30, 2026. Source
  • Weighted share count rose: Weighted average shares were 63.97 million in the quarter, against 55.63 million a year earlier. Source
  • Non-current restricted cash increased: Non-current restricted cash and marketable securities were $84.2 million at September 30, 2026, against $38.1 million at December 31, 2025. Source

Earlier plans management reported on

  • Not stated: Management reaffirmed the full-year 2026 cash burn range; the release does not state progress against it. Source

Other quarters

Summarised with AI from the documents the company filed with the SEC. Every point is checked against the filing before it is shown: management’s own words word for word, figures against the line or table row they come from. A point that fails the check is left out. Source opens the filing at that line.