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Lonza Group AG logo

Lonza Group AG

LZAGY
49
Biotechnology · Healthcare
Price
$70.18
-0.77 (-1.09%)
Market Cap
$49.94B
Exchange
Other OTC
Winston Score
49
Winston is serious
Mixed quality — meaningful strengths and weaknesses.

Share count falling — buybacks

5.7% over 4y

The company has reduced its share count over this period, returning value to shareholders through buybacks.

Diluted shares outstanding: 744.9M (2021) → 702.4M (2025)

Lonza Group is a Swiss company that makes the ingredients and finished products inside medicines — not the medicines themselves. It acts as a "factory for hire" for pharmaceutical and biotech companies, helping them manufacture drugs, including many biologics (medicines made from living cells) and cell and gene therapies. Lonza is one of the largest contract drug manufacturers in the world, serving major pharmaceutical companies like Moderna, Roche, and Novartis.

The company earns money by charging clients fees to use its manufacturing facilities and scientific expertise, a model known as contract development and manufacturing (CDMO). Lonza operates large facilities across Europe, the United States, and Asia, and generates roughly $6–7 billion in annual revenue. Its moat comes from the complexity and regulatory difficulty of building competing facilities, which takes years and billions of dollars. The key risk is customer concentration — losing a major contract, as happened when Moderna reduced its COVID vaccine orders, can meaningfully hurt revenue.

Winston Score History

Growth Profile

When traditional metrics don't capture the full picture, these are the signals growth stock investors use instead.

Revenue Growth

-16.0% YoY

YoY Growth Rate

Revenue declining

EPS Growth

-330.2% YoY

YoY Growth Rate

Earnings declining

R&D Spend

$0/ year

0.0% of revenue

Below sector average (18%)

Research and development spending

Insider Activity

90.2%ownership

Insiders own a meaningful stake in the company

Cash Position

Cash flow positive

$958M cash & investments

Quarterly Free Cash Flow

↓ Burn rate worsening

Company generates more cash than it spends — no dilution risk from fundraising

Revenue declining

Lonza Group AG's revenue is actually shrinking. In a growth stock, that removes the core investment thesis. The low Winston Score here may be warranted — unless there's a turnaround story.

The Winston Score above measures business quality today. Growth stocks often score lower because they invest in the future rather than maximising current profits. These metrics show what matters most for evaluating that future.

Score breakdown

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Quality

Gross Margin
34.4%
Modest — 34.4% gross margin
Operating Margin
23.8%
Excellent — 23.8% operating margin
ROCE
5.3%
Weak — 5.3% return on capital

ROIC between 5% and 15%. They earn 5 to 15 cents back per year on every dollar invested.

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Growth

Sales YoY
+1.3%
Nearly flat sales (1.3% YoY)
EPS YoY
-79.8%
Earnings shrinking (-79.8% YoY)

Earnings per share down more than 10%. Either a bad year, or a real decline.

EPS Consistency
2/8 quarters
Earnings rarely grow — volatile business

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Cash Flow

Cash Conversion
154%
Turns 154% of profit into real cash
FCF Margin
-2.7%
Burning cash (-2.7%)

Free cash flow is negative. They are burning cash, not generating it.

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Stability

Debt / Equity
0.46
Conservative — low debt load (0.46)
Interest Cover
8.38x
Comfortably covers interest (8.4x)

Interest coverage above 8. Profits cover interest many times over.

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Valuation

P/E Ratio (TTM)
137.6x
Expensive — P/E 137.6

P/E over 35. The market is pricing in heavy, sustained growth.

P/E vs Forward
+109.4
GROWING
Earnings expected to grow meaningfully — cheaper on forward P/E (137.6 → 28.2)

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Dividends

Dividend Yield
0.87%
Small dividend — 0.87% yield

Modest yield. The bulk of any return needs to come from price appreciation.

Dividend Growth
+51.4%
Dividend growing fast (51.4% YoY)

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