One-glance verdict
Within fair range
$54.98 our estimate vs market $50.22
Wall Street consensus: $49.02 (-10.8% lower than our fair-value estimate)
9% below our estimate
Fundamentals snapshot
Qiagen N.V.
QGEN · NYQ · Healthcare · Diagnostics & Research
Current price
$50.22
52-week range
$32.53 - $57.82
Market cap
$10.37B
Balance sheet
Healthy
15.65x Strong cushion
Net debt $860.20M. Interest coverage shows how many times profit covers the interest bill.
What stands out
3 Rewards
3 Risks
3 rewards · 3 risks
- Reward Revenue grew 5.7% last year.
- Reward Returns 11.9% on equity, ahead of 40% of its peers.
- Risk Net debt grew 53.3% over 3 years.
- Risk Insider ownership is only 0.5% (peer median: 5.5%).
What this company does
Qiagen N.V.
Qiagen makes the specialized testing kits and machines that labs and hospitals use to analyze biological samples, like blood or tissue, to find valuable genetic information. The company makes most of its money from selling these disposable kits, which creates a steady stream of recurring revenue (income that is likely to continue in the future) because customers must keep buying more. This technology is crucial for modern medicine, helping to diagnose diseases, conduct research, and even solve crimes.
How the company got here
Qiagen was started in 1984 by a group of scientists in Germany who developed a new, faster way to handle and isolate DNA from biological samples. This breakthrough was a key turning point, making it much easier for labs to do research. The company went public in the United States in 1996, becoming the first German company to be listed on the Nasdaq stock exchange. Over the years, Qiagen has grown by acquiring other companies to add new technologies, such as tests for specific diseases and software to analyze biological data. A major event was a failed acquisition attempt by a larger company, Thermo Fisher Scientific, in 2020, which ultimately left Qiagen to continue on its own path.
What it actually does
Think of Qiagen as a company that provides the tools and technologies for scientists and doctors to read and understand the instruction manuals of living things, like DNA and RNA. They create products that take a biological sample, like blood or tissue, and prepare it so the genetic information inside can be analyzed. Their customers are typically university researchers, pharmaceutical companies developing new drugs, and clinical labs that diagnose diseases. Essentially, Qiagen provides the crucial first steps and the analytical tools for everything from discovering new medicines to testing for infections or genetic conditions.
Diagnostic Solutions
This is Qiagen's largest business area, making up a little less than half of its sales. It provides molecular testing products that help doctors diagnose diseases. For example, their QuantiFERON test is a widely used blood test to detect tuberculosis infection. They also make automated systems like QIAstat-Dx that can test a patient's sample for a wide range of viruses and bacteria at once, helping to quickly identify the cause of an illness. Hospitals and clinical laboratories pay for these instruments and the test kits that run on them.
Sample Technologies
This segment, representing about a third of the company's business, is the foundation of what Qiagen does. It includes kits and automated instruments that are used to collect, stabilize, and purify DNA, RNA, and proteins from all sorts of biological materials. Imagine a scientist needing to study the genetics of a tumor; they would use these products to extract the pure DNA from the cancer cells before they can begin their analysis. Research labs and pharmaceutical companies are the main customers for these essential preparation tools.
PCR and Nucleic Acid Amplification
This part of the business, which is a smaller slice of the company's revenue, focuses on a technology called Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR). PCR is like a photocopier for DNA and RNA; it takes a tiny amount of genetic material and makes millions of copies so it's easier to detect and study. Qiagen sells the chemical kits and instruments, like its QIAcuity digital PCR system, that labs use to perform these tests for research and applied testing, such as food safety.
Genomics and Next-Generation Sequencing
This is another smaller but important segment that provides tools for advanced genetic analysis, including Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS), a technology that can read massive amounts of DNA very quickly. A key part of this business is QIAGEN Digital Insights, which offers bioinformatics software. Bioinformatics (the use of software to understand biological data) is crucial for making sense of the huge datasets produced by modern genetic research, helping scientists find meaningful patterns in the data. Pharmaceutical companies and large research centers use these tools to discover new drug targets and understand the genetic basis of diseases.
What management is betting on now
The company is focused on what it calls its five "growth pillars," which include its automated testing platforms (like QIAstat-Dx and QIAcuity), its sample preparation technologies, its tuberculosis test, and its bioinformatics software. Management is investing heavily in these areas to drive future sales, aiming to increase the number of instruments placed in labs, which in turn drives recurring revenue (the repeated sales of the test kits and supplies needed to run the machines). A major priority is expanding the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in its software to help researchers and clinicians interpret complex biological data more quickly and accurately. They are also making strategic acquisitions of smaller companies to bring in new, innovative technologies, particularly in high-growth areas like single-cell analysis and AI-driven data interpretation.
Price history
How the share price has moved
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Earnings history
Last 8 quarters — what happened
Click any quarter to read the call summary and what the numbers say.
FY2024 Q4
$506.38M
FY2025 Q4
$453.28M
Revenue
$2.09B
Net income
$424.88M
Diluted EPS
1.94
Operating cash flow
$654.33M
Free cash flow
$453.28M
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$1.98B
Net income
$83.59M
Diluted EPS
0.37
Operating cash flow
$673.55M
Free cash flow
$506.38M
Fetching…
Sources
Is it cheap or expensive?
Fair value $54.98 vs current price $50.22
Wall Street consensus is the average analyst price target: $49.02 (-10.8% lower than our fair-value estimate).
Our most-likely fair value is $54.98 a share — about 9.5% away from today's price of $50.22, so the stock currently looks fairly priced.
Is it drowning in debt?
Healthy
Net debt $860.2M. Interest coverage 15.6x.
Net debt
$860.20M
Interest coverage
15.65x
Qiagen N.V.'s profit covers its interest bill about 15.6 times over. which is stronger than most peers shown here.
Healthy
Worse cushion
Baseline
Better cushion
QGEN
BASELINE
Qiagen N.V.
Total debt $1.65B Interest coverage 15.65x This is the baseline the peer rows are being compared against.
Total debt $41.37B Interest coverage 5.72x -63% vs QGEN Carries about 2.7x less debt cushion than QGEN.
Total debt $27.78B Interest coverage 17.70x +13% vs QGEN Has roughly the same debt cushion as QGEN.
Total debt $4.15B Interest coverage 13.21x -16% vs QGEN Carries about 1.2x less debt cushion than QGEN.
Total debt $1.37B Interest coverage 4.46x -71% vs QGEN Carries about 3.5x less debt cushion than QGEN.
What you should know
The case for and against QGEN
3 Rewards
3 Risks
Rewards
-
Revenue grew 5.7% last year.
-
Returns 11.9% on equity, ahead of 40% of its peers.
-
Free cash flow was positive in 10/10 years.
Risks
-
Net debt grew 53.3% over 3 years.
-
Insider ownership is only 0.5% (peer median: 5.5%).
-
Operating margin compressed from 26.9% to 26.3% over 3 years.
The numbers
All the key metrics, grouped by purpose
Tap any ? icon to learn what it means.
Valuation
How expensive the stock looks
P/E (TTM)
25.49x
Forward P/E
19.22x
P/B
3.09x
P/S
4.94x
EV/EBITDA
15.30x
PEG ratio
1.34x
Profitability
How much profit each dollar creates
Gross margin
66.4%
Operating margin
26.3%
Net margin
19.5%
ROE
11.9%
ROA
5.9%
Health
Liquidity and balance-sheet strength
Debt / equity
0.49x
Current ratio
2.85x
Quick ratio
2.05x
Total debt
$1.65B
Total cash
$793.50M
Growth
How the business has been compounding
Revenue TTM
$8.18B
Revenue 5Y CAGR
-1.8%
EPS TTM
1.97
EPS 5Y CAGR
-9.9%
Cash flow
How much cash the business throws off
Operating CF TTM
$2.50B
Free CF TTM
$453.28M
FCF margin
5.5%
Dividend
Shareholder payout
Yield
0.7%
Payout ratio
17.8%
Last ex-div date
2026-07-07