By Dhirendra Tripathi
Investing.com – Quidel stock (NASDAQ:QDEL) rose 3% on Friday as the company produced and shipped highest ever number of tests in its history during the third quarter.
The company said it shipped over 45 million SARS tests in the September quarter, up 135%. Covid-19 revenue is expected to be approximately $406 million, compared to $375.7 million for the third quarter of 2020.
Demand for its rapid diagnostic tests during the pandemic is likely to have driven its third-quarter revenue well past estimates, according to a note by the company.
Releasing its preliminary numbers for the third quarter, Quidel said total revenue will be $507.5 million at midpoint, an increase of around 6.5% from July to September 2020’s $476.1 million.
President and CEO Douglas Bryant said as the Delta-variant spread, demand came in from both professional and retail channels.
A 12-month contract worth an expected $284 million for supply of up to 51.2 million QuickVue at-home over-the-counter rapid antigen tests from the federal government came the company’s way at the end of the quarter. The size of the government order has not yet been confirmed, Bryant said in a note.
He said the company is also on-track to reach the target run-rate capacity of approximately 70 million rapid antigen tests per month by the end of the year.
Quidel expects to issue full financial results for the fiscal third quarter of 2021 in November.