Alamar Biosciences Eyes Proteomics Gold Standard as Alzheimer’s Research Fuels Adoption

Alamar Biosciences (NASDAQ:ALMR) CEO and co-founder Yuling Luo said the company is seeking to establish “a new gold standard in protein detection and analysis” through its precision proteomics platform, emphasizing rapid commercial adoption, strong use in Alzheimer’s disease research and a longer-term path toward diagnostics.

Speaking at a Bank of America Life Science Tools and Diagnostics event, Luo said proteins account for more than 90% of drug targets and argued that proteomics remains “largely untapped” because of limitations in existing technologies. He said Alamar’s platform is designed to combine five features the company views as critical for precision medicine and early disease detection: ultra-high sensitivity, high specificity, flexible multiplex capability, broad dynamic range and seamless automation.

“We believe we are the only solution that combines all five critical pillars together with really very high performance,” Luo said.

Company Highlights Commercial Adoption

Luo said Alamar launched its precision proteomics platform at the beginning of 2024 and has since seen what he described as the fastest adoption in the proteomics industry. He said the company generated more than $74 million in revenue by the end of last year, had more than 100 installed systems and achieved annual instrument pull-through of more than $400,000.

He also said revenue nearly doubled in the first quarter versus the prior year and that gross margin improved significantly, though he did not provide specific quarterly figures in the presentation.

According to Luo, consumables accounted for about 50% of total revenue at an early stage of adoption, consistent with what he described as a “razor blade” business model in which instrument placements drive recurring consumable sales. He said biopharma represented 44% of revenue last year and that every one of the top 10 pharmaceutical companies by 2024 revenue was an Alamar customer last year.

Luo said one top 10 pharmaceutical company began with Alamar’s Technology Access Program at the end of 2023, adopted its first instrument by mid-2024 and later expanded to additional systems across geographies and disease areas.

Focus on Proteomics Market and Technology

Luo said the total proteomics market, including research and diagnostics, is currently estimated at close to $50 billion and is expected to grow to $80 billion over the next decade. He said Alamar’s goal is to be the “Illumina for proteomics,” pointing to its combination of instruments, consumables and software.

The CEO described Alamar’s NULISA technology as a differentiated approach that improves signal-to-noise ratio by suppressing background noise, rather than only boosting signals. He said the company has achieved a 10,000-fold improvement in signal-to-noise ratio and characterized that capability as one of the company’s key technology advantages. Luo said the technology is protected by issued patents and more than five years of trade secrets.

Alamar’s platform is intended to support applications ranging from high-plex discovery to middle-plex translation and, eventually, low-plex clinical diagnostic uses, Luo said.

Alzheimer’s and Neurology Research Drive Early Use

Luo said Alamar’s platform has been “extremely well adopted” in Alzheimer’s disease research, with researchers using it to study multiple biomarkers and generate biological insights that could potentially be translated into future diagnostics.

By the end of the first quarter, Luo said Alamar had seen 124 publications, including peer-reviewed articles and preprints, across disease areas such as neurology, immunology and oncology. He said Alzheimer’s disease alone accounted for more than 40 publications.

The company has also received support from neurological foundations. Luo cited the Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation, saying it provided $10 million in funding to help accelerate the transition from Alamar’s current research-use-only platform to an FDA-cleared in vitro diagnostic platform. Luo said the company expects to submit for clearance next year.

Product Menu Expansion

Luo said near-term growth will be driven in part by content expansion. Alamar launched an Inflammation Panel in January 2024 and a CNS 120-marker panel for central nervous system disease in mid-2024, which Luo described as the company’s flagship product.

The company has also launched home-brew assay kits, a brain-derived p-tau 217 assay for Alzheimer’s disease and a 5-plex Alzheimer’s assay that measures five biomarkers in a single assay. Luo said those biomarkers are included in Alzheimer’s Association guidelines.

At the AD/PD conference in March, Luo said Alamar launched the NULISAseq Neuro 220 Panel, which includes 100 additional biomarkers beyond the CNS Disease Panel 120. He said the panel includes a large set of phospho-tau assays and Parkinson’s disease-related markers supported by the Michael J. Fox Foundation.

Strategic Priorities and Investor Catalysts

Luo outlined five strategic priorities for the company:

• Expand commercial infrastructure to drive global adoption.
• Strengthen leadership in neurology and inflammation while expanding into areas such as cardiology, metabolism, oncology and aging.
• Enable laboratory-developed tests and in vitro diagnostic tests, with an FDA clearance submission expected next year.
• Develop a lower-cost instrument tailored to individual and emerging labs.
• Build an ecosystem for partners to develop differentiated diagnostic tests.

Asked about near-term catalysts for investors, Luo said the main drivers would be content expansion, continued expansion of the commercial infrastructure and use of biological insights generated by publications and key opinion leaders to highlight additional use cases.

“Those are gonna be the major driver for near-term growth,” Luo said.

About Alamar Biosciences (NASDAQ:ALMR)

Our mission is to power precision proteomics to enable the earliest detection of disease. We are a commercial-stage proteomics company establishing a gold standard in protein detection and analysis. Our proprietary NULISA technology was purpose-built to address the limitations of existing proteomics tools by detecting protein biomarkers at extremely low concentrations in non-invasive biological fluids, such as blood, with ultra-high sensitivity, high specificity, flexible multiplexing, broad dynamic range and seamless automation.