All right. I think we can look to get started here, so thanks, everyone, for being here. I'm Patrick Donnelly, the tools and diagnostics analyst here at Citi. Happy to have the Agilent team. We have Tom Callahan, the Chief Transformation Officer, and then Tejas and Mark from the IR team, so maybe, Tom, just given your seat, maybe we can start with some of the Ignite pieces. Padraig's obviously made a given us some detail on that piece. It's been a pretty big change for the company. I think we're about a year in at this point to some of the Ignite transition, some of the reorganization. Maybe just talk about what you've seen so far. What are some of the key things you're implementing, and certainly have some specifics on it as well.
Yeah, I think if we take a step back, as you indicated, it's been a year journey, but we've really been executing it for about six months, right, and so because the first six months were about planning, scoping, and things like that. I think if you think about the broader change in the organization, I think the one thing that's materially changed in the organization is really the need to change, and the fact that an enterprise approach the company has historically made a lot of its decision-making at a bottoms-up, start with the product lines, move up into the divisions.
But it was important with Ignite to start showing the benefit of actually taking an enterprise approach to decision-making, whether it's the pricing part about it, whether it's looking at our NPIs across the organization, which we had a very long tail of, and start doubling down on the most material things to the customer that create the biggest value. Those have made big changes to the organization. And one of the big mindsets is that we started out 10, 12 projects. And they're enterprise projects. They're work streams, whatever you want to call them. And then all of a sudden, and it was a little bit of a push and prove it. But what's really happened over the course of the last six months in particular, once we started executing things, getting results, people were seeing the differences in what they do. Now that they're coming to us, right?
And so instead of the push out, it's more like, hey, we've got some ideas. We think enterprise approach will work good for this. That's how, as an example, we never started out with the tariff as a work stream, but that came in front of us. The AI opportunity has evolved over the course of the year. So what we're having is a situation instead of us coming up with the ideas, it's actually the organization really coming forward with us. And it's a good indication of how they've embraced it.
Yeah, and to your point, I mean, I think you guys have talked about this 12-prong approach. I think six are in motion. I guess what are some of the biggest changes you've seen? And what are maybe some of the ones still to come that you have an eye on?
The whole idea was to really have a balance, right? When we started out, this was the importance of Ignite and transformation. It wasn't going to be a one-year journey. It was really going to be an operating model going forward. So what you wanted to do is have a balance of what I'll call quick wins, funding the journey, however you want to call it, and then fundamental investments, right? The initial things we started out with were, we've seen better value than I think in a lot of cases we even expected is, as an example, on procurement because we wanted to start Ignite and transformation with the top line growing, the customer, and then the operating margin and the operations improvement.
And I think that's really important because I think when people start thinking about transformations, they usually go right to the cost line. I think it was really important that this became driven by the customer, top line growth, and then obviously there's operating margin improvement. And so we did have a focus initially on pricing as an opportunity, as I indicated. Historically, we'd do some bottoms-up pricing almost at a product code level, right? But that's not how the customer views us. The customer views us as the total solution where they're buying the services, the consumables, and the instrumentation and the software.
So taking a more strategic approach to pricing and valuing what really matters to the customer and having it marketed driven is instead of doing kind of these peanut butter spread pricing changes that we've done historically, I think has made not only an impact on how we actually price it, but it's actually really connected with the sales teams and the commercial teams because that's how the customer views it. And our pricing opportunities are really in the areas in particular where the customer we're driving the most value and productivity for the customer. So it works out very well.
Yep. And you mentioned the tariff piece. That was, I think, where Ignite really kind of showed some promise is a very quick reaction to the tariffs, the mitigation side. Maybe talk about how you guys approached that, what advantages you had because of where Ignite was and how you're mitigating the tariffs overall?
Yeah. Well, what we realized when we first started out with the tariffs is the one benefit we had is that we had large manufacturing areas and sites where our largest customer bases are. So whether it was the U.S. or Europe or China or Asia outside of China, we had a big advantage. We thought that at least having locations closest to our largest customer base. So it allowed us to kind of quickly understand that if you focus on your major products, your large instrumentation, your LCs, your GCs, your columns, you'll focus those and move those around the world. And we really obviously developed capability around the world to kind of manufacture the same products at different locations around the world.
What we did is what we didn't realize is because it wasn't quite as incremental as you would think and additive work, we actually leveraged a lot of what was going on at Ignite. Because Ignite had already been going through the process of regionalizing. We used to be plant by plant all around the world. We started getting into a much more regional structure. That very, very easily fit into what we needed to do for tariffs on the procurement side. We started doing instead of just doing localized procurement opportunities, we actually took the power and the benefit of the total Agilent volume and started doing global RFPs. We were able to quickly leverage that as well as the pricing opportunity we talked about. The nice thing about the tariff situation is we had active work streams that we could quickly leverage.
That's where we were able to kind of mitigate things as quickly as we did.
Yeah, and did you guys, in terms of obviously some folks moved different production areas around, what was your guys' approach in terms of the footprint reacting to obviously there were some headlines, then they changed, then they changed again. How did you guys react to the various headlines? Were you moving production?
I think the first thing we have to do is we wanted to make no regret moves, right? Regardless of what the tariff rates are today versus tomorrow and how that plays out, we wanted to make moves. We think there's a fundamental move where we're going to be manufacturing closer to our largest customer bases, right? When we make those moves, we don't make those with it helps to mitigate the tariff situation, obviously. If you're not making something in Europe, you decide to make it in the United States as an example to avoid 15% tariffs. At the same time, what you're also doing though is we really think these are fundamental moves. Making our major products in various locations around the world is something we'll just regardless of the tariff rate, I think that's there to stay.
Okay. That's helpful. Yeah, go ahead, Tejas.
Sure.
We're pretty well positioned relative to some of our peers there. We flex up to that. And then that is the core sort of muscle that.
Yeah. It's a perfect example of you make that no regret move to kind of move to be able to start manufacturing different things, as an example, in China for the tariffs. And then you have that situation occur and you just continue to double down on it.
Yep. Okay. Makes sense. So I have some more on Ignite, but we'll circle back on that in a minute. Tejas, maybe on a high level, you guys just reported, I think it was just last week, and you put out the 26 guide, 4%-6%. I guess when you think about that range, maybe just give us some quick hits in terms of what went into the range, maybe some variables low end to the high end. Would love just some context around how you guys approached it.
Yeah. I mean, broadly speaking, I would say it really comes down to three key sort of swing factors that we like to handicap at the low versus the high end of the guide, right? So the high end of the guide, we're expecting the pharma recovery to continue and broaden out. China is assumed to be stable at roughly around $300 million a quarter. There's going to be some quarter- over- quarter volatility there which we can get into separately. But essentially, any stimulus benefit, particularly on that large order, would be upside to that number even at the high end of the guide. And then, of course, I mean, if you look down at the NL, the operating margin benefit from the stronger volume leverage, the pricing gains, et cetera, could give us upside to that 75 basis points, right?
That 6%, we think we could probably do an extra sort of 15 basis points fairly easy. Now, worst case at the low end of the guide, we're expecting SMID-cap biotech to remain pressured, right? The marginal data point there, October funding, some of the M&A activity, et cetera, is all positive. But we'll see what the Fed does. In a few weeks here, that could easily shut the window if we call it a pattern. And so we're not ready to really call for a recovery in SMID-cap biotech. Obviously, that's small exposure for us, but something to keep an eye on. And then China, I mean, we're assuming it's going to be flat, but at the low end, we might see a little bit of downside there. And so we wanted to factor that in as well. And then the third piece is academic and government.
That's our smallest end market, but still is about 8% of our end market. So any kind of worsening there relative to our low single-digit client expectation, that's another piece of the puzzle there at the low end of the guide. We still think operating margin should be in that 60 basis points plus or even at the low end. So that's how I would frame the bookends, the 4 to 6 and the bands around the.
25.
Okay. That's helpful. And then China, always a topic with you guys, just given the size of the revenue base. You mentioned $300 million a quarter, probably reasonable. You guys have been stable there for some time. How are you thinking about China? What did you see in fiscal 4Q? And then again, to your point, you guys pulled stimulus out of the number for 2026. How are you thinking about just the setup in China as you move into next year?
Yeah. I mean, look, I would say that underlying growth on an ex-stimulus basis is a little bit better than flattish, right? But we weren't ready to really call for a more robust sort of broadening out of the recovery because you look at the different end markets for us there. Essentially, we are a little bit over-indexed to applied. We're under-indexed to pharma and clinical in the region. Outside of academic and government, which grew mid-single digit for us, all the other end markets were down in the quarter. On the other hand, it's like you do get these quarterly swings, right? So in the first quarter of next year, for example, in the guide, we think China will actually grow reasonably. But then in the second quarter, we've got tougher comps.
And that comes down to the lunar new year timing plus the consumables benefit that we saw, the pull forward we saw in the second quarter of fiscal 2025. So you're going to see sort of China growth look good, then it's probably going to swing the other way a little bit. But for the full year, we still think flat is a reasonable sort of assumption. Now, to your second part of the question on the STIM, we could sort of see that come through late in the year. We just didn't want to assume that at this stage. If you look at the process, the tender process last time on the first round of stimulus, we think we can deliver pretty quickly in terms of the revenue conversion there once we win that tender.
So it could come through late this year, just not something we were prepared to assume.
Yeah. You might get the orders this year, but it might not generate revenue in the following year. I think the other thing just to emphasize on China is too that gives us some comfort level, at least in the forecast being stable, is our share remains very stable along with that 300 billion a quarter.
Yep. And then, Tejas, to your point, are there certain markets in China that are maybe taking a little bit longer to come back? Obviously, you guys play in some different areas over there. How are you seeing that market? Are the verticals where you feel better or verticals that are maybe lagging a little bit over there?
Yeah, Mark.
Yeah, I can take that, Patrick. I mean, I think as we look, I would say there's some dynamics going on in the pharma space where probably a little bit better outlook for the biotech part of pharma. We've seen obviously a lot of funding this year around molecule outlicensing and things like that. Some of the changes that are being made around this anti-involution and basically the looking towards more advanced kind of development, the government encouraging more advanced modalities, we think is probably going to be a good longer-term trend for the biotech. We'll see how that plays out this year. But I mean, I would say that would be a stronger area. I think the ones where, yeah, I mean, the applied markets probably expect to be pretty subdued for the year.
I mean, that's where some of the broader economic issues probably play a little bit more into the results. And then ANG is just, I think it tends to be very stimulus-based, right? And when is the government going to provide funding? In the last few years, we've seen some regular funding there. Remains to be seen what's going to go on. We kind of think of that as separate than the stimulus that we've talked about, the larger kind of broader stimulus.
Sure. And you mentioned the anti-involution. It came up a little bit as the quarter went. You guys flagged it. I think you said you haven't seen anything, but it just raised the flag of caution. Maybe just frame that up for us and for the folks who aren't aware of what it is. Maybe just give some quick background.
Yeah. I mean, I think generally it is our sense that we've gotten from their teams there, that it's a push by the government to move in all areas really of the economy. I talked about pharma, but we do see this beyond away from this kind of race to the bottom, lowest price is the only thing. And they feel that I think they've sort of encouraged that with their tender processes and their public tenders in terms of just seeking out the absolute lowest price. And so that's what I think that they've sort of signaled a shift away from and that they want to start taking into account things like complexity and benefits to consumer or whatever, things beyond just price, essentially.
Our team sees that as, hey, that's them sort of shifting away and being able to encourage more advanced technologies and development of those and make those investments worthwhile because at the back end, there's an expectation that that's going to be rewarded rather than just the absolute lowest dollar. I think we've talked about it in the context of pharma, but I mean, it's also in the context of, I think, even in the industrial parts of the space, the applied markets, things like solar or semiconductor stuff where there will be sort of encouragement for more advanced technologies and not just solutions.
I think that, Patrick, that is also worth noting is the timeline to implementation, right? I mean, it's sort of a three-to-five-year sort of time period. Local governments at the province level could go faster. So we're keeping a very close eye on that. And the local team is already sort of being proactive about this. And as I mentioned earlier, as part of the Ignite sort of program, we can certainly flex manufacturing or local manufacturing content as needed to position us better.
Yep. And so, I mean, is the way you guys would frame it, you're aware of it, haven't really seen an impact, but a reason just given how variable China has been, let's call it, a reason to just kind of hang at this $300 million a quarter for now and just see how it plays out?
Yeah.
Okay. Fair enough. And then maybe some other pieces, Tejas, you touched a little bit on the margins, right? You guys are talking about 75 basis points. I think you said if you hit 6%, maybe there's another 15 basis points or so there. The margins have been an area of focus for investors, let's say, in terms of the past few quarters. Again, the revenue beats have been big. Earnings beats maybe a little less so. Maybe just talk about the flow through of these revenue beats to the margins. Why have the margins maybe been a little lacking the last couple of quarters? And the right way to think about the go forward. Obviously, there's a lot going in there, right? Tariffs, things like Ignite with you, Tom. So yeah, maybe just frame up the margin framework for us.
Yeah. So maybe I'll actually hand it to Tom because he's looked at that sort of very closely and certainly the Ignite piece and all that.
I think the thing that impacts the second half of the year, as you indicate, even with the higher revenue and maybe not as much margin pull-through, it's really two factors that we call out. Number one, it is the tariff compare, right? And we'll have that compare. We'll mitigate tariffs, but we're going to lower tariffs and offset it by pricing and some other things. But tariffs will not go away. So the comp that we have for the second half of the year, because the tariffs really started kicking in in April and that was the beginning of our third quarter, that really is a second half of the year compare. At the same time, we clearly over-delivered the year. So the variable comp component of that took place, which is great news. And the third thing is the Ignite stuff is just starting to kick in, right?
That's just, and so are the mitigations. We're kind of in an upswing on that. Then we'll continue. If you look at 2026, you'll still have the tariff impact year- on- year, right, for the first half, not the second half, right? Because they would have fully been in the second half. The variable comp component will be a lot more comparable 2025 to 2026. It'll go up a little bit because of inflation, but other than that, it's a much better comparison. We wouldn't expect big fluctuations in that unless we well over-deliver the six some way. Finally, the Ignite stuff continues to kick in and ramp up. That's why we feel as though when the revenue, as the revenue gets generated, we'll be in more of an accretive growth on the operating margin side.
Okay. That's helpful.
And the other thing I would add there, Patrick, is starting the year, we're probably going to be down about 40 basis points year- over- year. That is almost entirely driven by the tariff dynamic because there is no tariff in the comp, right? And then through the year, we were expecting very robust sequential margin improvement. I mean, a lot of that is largely driven by seasonality that we see through the year. But then in addition to that, you'll get the tariff and the variable comp stuff, which again, at the annual level, they're roughly net out. But on the year-over-year compared to the quarterly level, you got to think about those dynamics.
Yeah. Yeah. No, that's helpful. And then I guess another part of the margin piece is the pricing side. We certainly get questions there. Tom, I know it's an initiative for you guys as well. How do you guys think about the pricing piece? What's the contribution as we work our way into 2026? Any changes in terms of the pricing environment from your perspective?
In 2024 before Ignite, we did about a half a point improvement. We doubled that, a little over doubled that in 2025. So our jump-off point is we view it going into 2026 is really at least a point, if not more, because I think we have a good jump-off point and good momentum, especially as the things we're implementing in Ignite are continually being adopted globally, right? Again, as I would just reiterate with Ignite, all the things we're doing are really starting to kick that in in the second half of 2025. So now you're going to start to get more annualized basis to the opportunity and it gets adopted more throughout the company.
Sure. And another piece of the margins is obviously the specialty CDMO. I think you guys are characterizing it now with NASD and BioVectra combined. I know that's a gross margin drag and that's been something the models have taken a little bit to get cleaned up. Maybe just contextualize what the margin structure there is. I think it's $450 million-$500 million of revs. Obviously, we'll dive into that in a bit. But just the margin piece, is that dilutive on the gross margins? I believe NASD positive op margins, accretive op margins, BioVectra obviously not yet. But yeah, maybe just talk through what the specialty CDMO does to the margins and how to think about that.
Yeah. I mean, it's a good business, right? I mean, that's one of the reasons we want to, it is a specialized CDMO with specialized modalities. Customers value what we're doing, right? If we look at 2025, the combined businesses were accretive to adjusted on its overall margin at an operating margin level, not as you said, at a gross margin level. Obviously, it's just a different profile, different structure on the business, higher COGS, lower OpEx. But at an Agilent level, they were accretive combined. As you mentioned, I think there's definitely a difference. I mean, NASD is at a higher level. We think there's good opportunity. Obviously, we talked about that when we did the acquisition. I think we kind of delivered what we thought with expectations as far as BioVectra, but do see nice upside there going forward.
So we think that that could come up to Agilent margin levels. But even as a combined business already, it is above Agilent overall. So we're really excited about the potential there and with growth. Growth really helps the margins in that business as it does with any business. But that's something we're pretty excited about.
Yeah. Yeah. Maybe we can dive into that piece now, the specialty CDMO. Maybe we can start with NASD. Again, obviously some really nice trends there. It had a couple of challenging years with the clinical commercial piece and now seems very squarely back on track, opening up some new lines, I think end of this year into 2027. But maybe talk about the visibility. I believe you guys talked about orders kind of covering all of 2026. I think Train C and D will open up late this year into next. So maybe just what you're seeing there, how to think about the growth rate. I think you talked mid-teens for the entire specialized CDMO. But maybe on the NASD piece, how do we think about that business and the trends you're seeing? It certainly feels like it's a pretty healthy backdrop here for you guys.
Yeah. I mean, we're really excited about both businesses. I would say NASD, really it's hard to sort of, it's like picking your child, right? I guess they're both doing very well. We're really managing them together. I think we've seen a lot of benefits. Some of the synergies that we've seen really have been around operational, using and leveraging what we've learned and what we've implemented at NASD into BioVectra and kind of getting that discipline and being able to deliver. And so that's been really, really nice to see. I think as we look into next year, right? I mean, I think demand for the modalities that they serve is really strong. We're really optimistic and encouraged. I think we do have more demand, frankly. I think we have to manage our capacity carefully.
Part of being a good partner to our pharma customers and something that we think is a big success of the business is that we are always available when they need to do something. That means that we don't overschedule capacity. We schedule to be as full as we can be. But we're not committing to new customers that, hey, we'll do this for you even though we don't really have space in the plan, right? So that's a big part of the success. But I mean, I think as we see the siRNA, GLP-1 capabilities at BioVectra, siRNA obviously at NASD, I think we're seeing continued momentum on approvals there. I believe there was one a few weeks ago. The demand for those modalities is just really strong in pharma.
As you mentioned, I mean, we have really good line of sight to what we're going to be doing there. Excited, early 2027 is when we expect to open sort of the Train C element, the first part of that new expansion. So that's really the largest part of that expansion in terms of volume capacity. And so.
What I'd say there, Patrick, is also that expansion Train C and D. It's quite well timed in terms of coinciding with our customers' regulatory timelines, which should help, right, with the capacity utilization and what happens, margins, etc. there. The other piece which I think is worth emphasizing here is that the commercial versus clinical mix, right. It's 60/40 now, and we think it only gets more skewed towards commercial through 2026. That's always a good thing, right. It's good to have anchor tenants, but it's also good to have a healthy sort of commercial skew to make sure you have good line of sight and near-term revenue generation.
It's not only good line of sight, but production batches. It's just a more efficient process, a more predictable process. So the big pivot for us to what you indicated is really nice is the skew towards the commercial versus the clinical over the last 18 months has been pretty encouraging and not depending upon a single product as an example for the volume.
Yep. And when you guys look at the business, as you talked about, maybe a little bit capacity constrained. I mean, is there potential upside to numbers or is it really you're kind of maxed out until, and I think Train C is more siRNA? Are you just kind of constrained a little bit or do you save a little bit of capacity and say, all right, just in case these customers need it, maybe those numbers move up a little bit as the year goes? How do we think about that?
I would say, look, we've always hoped there will be upside to that mid-teens number. To Mark's earlier point, I mean, NASD is also much larger than BioVectra. So you got to think about that as you factor in the growth rates there. Low single numbers probably helps BioVectra a little bit more at this stage. But the pipelines are really good. We feel pretty good about how that business is shaping up, not just into 2026, but even beyond.
Sure. And that mid-teens, oh, sorry, go ahead.
No, and you wouldn't forget to add capacity in terms of the efficiency of the manufacturing process itself. We continue to get better and better refined. The yields continue to get better for us. And so that helps even with the current footprint to add capacity over time.
Is that mid-teens growth rate, is it reasonable to think of NASD and BioVectra similar in that mid-teens? Is that about right?
Similar-ish.
Similar-ish. Okay. That's fair enough. And I guess with BioVectra, you guys came out, obviously. I think a lot of people feel that there's some reasonable GLP exposure there. You guys talked about the overall GLP business, I believe it was $130 million, which was higher than a lot of folks I talked to were expecting. Maybe talk about the GLP exposure, the part in BioVectra, the part that's not, and the tailwinds you're seeing there. Obviously, the oral piece, I think, has a lot of eyeballs on it. You guys do have some exposure there, I believe. So maybe just talk about the GLP side and again, what to make of that business as we go forward.
Yeah. So, as you suggested, Patrick, $130 million in 2025, it is roughly evenly split between BioVectra where you get the synthetic peptide stuff and then on the analytical tools piece. I mean, we are very optimistic about the opportunity. I mean, the key takeaway really is that we are indexed to volume here rather than price or modality, right? And let's sort of, I think it's worth sort of double-clicking into each of those dynamics a little bit. So on the recent deals with the GLP-1 manufacturers that have signed with the Trump administration, really, I mean, the key takeaway there is that we have these price reductions for the Medicare and Medicaid patient populations. You have direct-to-consumer access. And then ultimately, you potentially have label expansion coming down the road as well, right?
And so all of that stuff is sort of good for us in terms of greater volume. And then, frankly, we have seen meaningful sort of recent RFP activity there related to greenfield expansion. So we feel pretty good about how that piece is shaping up. And then on the second point on sort of the oral launches coming up, etc., frankly, we are modality agnostic. And the idea here is that you've got on the injectable side, as those continue to scale, the demand for chrom and mass spec tools used in characterization, release testing, some of the regulated QC stuff is only going to increase. And then on the pill form, the idea here is you should see accelerating demand for small molecule analytics, right?
Whether that's impurity profiling, dissolution testing, solid dose method development, stability assessments, etc., those are all sort of areas where we have differentiation and pretty deep penetration. Pretty optimistic about that GLP-1 piece on a go-forward basis. I think one of the questions that people have asked in post-earnings is a little bit sort of maturing of the analytical tools piece of the puzzle there. I think it's still very early. Again, just the indexation to volumes plays in our favor there. The pill launches, again, are at least in our minds, more of an expansion of the GLP-1 opportunity for us rather than any sort of cannibalization dynamic or what have you.
Yeah. No, that's really helpful. And I guess on BioVectra specifically, I know there's some confusion in the quarter about the acquisition contribution versus what BioVectra actually was. I guess there was two months inorganic, then it flipped organic. October was bigger. Maybe just a quick context around that. I know you guys might not give the exact number, but yeah, maybe just help us frame that up a little bit.
Yeah. I mean, just the linearity in the quarter, right? The first couple of months were relatively light versus our expectations, and October was pretty strong. I mean, I would say that it's one of those situations where October was actually a little bit larger than the first two months combined. Now, look, I mean, the CDMO businesses, I mean, you and I have lived through enough of those, Patrick, where lumpiness is just the nature of the game, certainly on a month-to-month basis, if not across quarters, right, and then that's important to keep in mind. I think really the important thing to understand there is that there's no pull forward of demand that happened here. We had that question as well, so is there going to be some sort of an air pocket after this huge October?
I would certainly sort of, I'm in the camp of no sort of weird one-offs. This is just lumpiness that comes through.
If you kind of keep in mind, as we talked about in the third quarter, we had the shutdown deliberately to build the capacity. That was going to play out not right away in the fourth quarter. It was going to play out throughout the fourth quarter.
Yeah. Yeah. And Tom, maybe to that point, one of the questions we got was, obviously, you guys did the shutdown in 3Q. I think there were some questions, were you transitioning capacity from some other modality into GLPs or were you expanding it and now the pie is bigger? What's the right way to think about that?
Yeah. It was expansion, right? It was taking a process that we had, modifying it, increasing basically the throughput of that process to be able to deliver more. And so it was an existing customer with an expansion.
That's helpful, and then maybe just flipping over to the instrument side of the portfolio, obviously some nice tailwinds there as well. You guys are in the midst of a bit of a replacement cycle at the moment. Maybe talk about where we are in that and then would love to kind of get into the year-end budget flush and expectations there as well.
Yeah, so look, I mean, I don't want to sort of overemphasize the budget flush dynamic. That's not certainly something that we are counting on in any particularly material way. I'll turn it over to Mark for which inning in the replacement cycle we are on. It's not mid for sure, but it's not the first inning either, and then Mark, you double-click on that and the GC piece.
Yeah. No, I mean, I think as we look at the replacement cycle, Patrick, I mean, for those baseball averse, maybe we're offering first quartile of the replacement cycle maybe as a way to think about it. And certainly on the LC side. And I think as we think that we're in that space, these typically two to three-year kind of replacement cycles is kind of the norm historically. And we think it could be within our LC business, probably 200 to 300 basis points of incremental growth relative to kind of long-term growth rates for that space or for that business. So really optimistic. And obviously with Infinity III, I think we have a reason. We're giving customers a good reason to go back and replace.
It's not just, hey, your stuff's old, but also, hey, we got some exciting productivity improvements, some exciting improvements in the platform, and customers are really liking it. So I mean, I think that that's kind of just doubling down on that and really helping to drive that decision within the customer base.
That plays out a little differently on GC.
Yeah. On the GC side, that is a longer-life instrument. And I think that has implications on how the replacement cycle works. I would say that it's a longer cycle with probably a shallower slope. So instead of two to three years, probably more like three to four to maybe even five years of kind of increase and a smaller amount, probably more like 100 basis points on the kind of the overall GC business versus long-term rate. So still a nice driver, but it's a bit smoother just given that those instruments kind of have a longer lifespan.
Sure. Yeah. It makes a lot of sense. And I guess on that piece, Tejas, you touched a little bit on the budget flush side. Pharma, I think you guys are talking about high single-digit type growth for 2026. There's been a lot of focus on pharma just given the policy removal of the overhang, hopefully, a couple of months ago. What have those conversations been like? It was an interesting timing. Obviously, we were out with you guys the day or two after that and things were moving quick. But I guess what's your perspective? Have the conversations changed? Has the tone changed? Obviously, the reshoring piece we can get into, but even more near-term, are those budgets loosening up and are those purse strings finally loosening up from the pharma side?
Yeah, for sure. I mean, I think it's important to sort of differentiate between the larger cap sort of customers and then mid-cap biotech, right? So larger cap, both on the pharma and biotech side, continue to see the conversations get better. I mean, we talked about decentralized decision-making a quarter ago and that certainly has continued as well. I mean, in the context of the MFN tariff stuff, the turning over of that card is really a positive in and of itself, right? Because now people have guardrails in place as they frame what's coming next down the pipe. And frankly, for a lot of these companies, the LOEs that they're facing over the next five years or so, that's certainly top of mind as well. And that becomes the priority now.
And you've seen that manifest not just in terms of the flow of dollars on equipment and consumables and all the rest of it, but even on M&A, right? There's been a big pickup in biotech M&A over the last sort of six months or so. And that helps on the mid-cap side as well to my earlier point about the fact that there are those sort of happy outcomes in play. And the expectation is for interest rates to come down as well. So you're starting to see the dollars flow there as well. It's still early on the mid-cap biotech piece. I mean, that's like low single digit of total revenue for us. So not a hugely meaningful driver of volatility in a sense. But certainly on the large cap side of things, I would say that things look to be steadily improving.
Yeah. We got the clarity, whether it's the tariffs or the MFN, that clarity for big pharma has helped and gives us comfort level that we're into more normalized, whether you call it a replacement cycle or a normalized kind of budget flash at year-end, that gives us a bit more comfort level.
Sure. And then the out-year carrot was the reshoring piece. You guys threw out, you were brave enough to put a number out there. I don't know if anyone else did, but you guys talked about the billion-dollar opportunity, maybe 30% of that could be yours. I guess what went into that number? I think it's through 2030. Maybe just talk about where that came from, how you're thinking about it, and what that opportunity looks like.
Sure. I mean, look, so we looked at it both on a top-down and bottom-up basis, right? And so if you look at sort of the announced sort of CapEx investments in that $350 billion-$400 billion range, we assumed about 2.5% of that is going to be lab instrument spend. And then about 10% of that is what we serve, right? So that's how you get to that sort of approaching a $1 billion sort of zip code opportunity. And again, we think we can capture about a third of that over the course of, let's say, three or four years, right? Now, the other lens that we took on it was to look at it on a bottom-up basis, right? So we took it, we looked at each individual sort of company that has announced a capacity investment here.
And then we made certain assumptions around the number of greenfield sites and the number of labs per site. And from there, you can sort of, just based on our extensive experience dealing with these customers, you can make assumptions around instrument spend and then the consumables and the services piece layering on probably a year, year and a half later after that instrument investment, right? And so we did that sort of bottom-up build at a pretty detailed level. And the good news here, Patrick, is that a lot of these pharma companies that have announced these investments, they map quite nicely to our strategic customer program, which is obviously a very high priority for our commercial teams. And we are in sort of almost biweekly conversations with those customers. So we have a very good lens.
Now, look, I don't want to kind of paint a picture of false precision, right? So this is not about like, oh, let's take $75 million-$100 million and throw it into the model for 2027 to 2030. That's not the point of this exercise. I think it's still early. We got to make some sort of, we'll find out more about sort of how much of this is incremental, how much of this is sort of investments that were going to happen outside the states are now happening here, etc. But directionally, we feel pretty good about that number.
Yeah. Because we are at least starting, we're in conversations now. So it gives us something. Again, we're not at the order-taking standpoint, but to the point that Tejas was making, we feel like there'll be more and more activity will grow throughout the year, become more definitive, and more of a revenue play for 2027 from a material level.
To be clear on that point, Patrick, there's nothing in revenue in 2026 for reshoring. Maybe a little bit of weather benefit late in the year, but that's about it.
Okay. And then Tom, maybe back on the Ignite side. I know AI has been one tool you guys have talked about, just improving productivity measures. What businesses are you planning on kind of layering AI in on? What's the right way to think about where you guys are in this? It's obviously a big, big theme out there.
No, I know. I think the first thing we did is the importance of bringing it into Ignite, particularly because it's the nice shiny tool. But what happens is you got to get deliberate results out of it, right? Otherwise, people just keep playing with it and experimenting with it. We see it in a couple of different ways. Obviously, the digital customer-facing experience and AI and helping customers purchase the consumables in particular online, we see a big benefit. But we have a lot of customer-facing activities that involve very technical information, whether it's with our service teams, whether it's with our pre or post-sales teams, whether it's our call centers, right? And so there is a lot of technical detailed information and getting that information efficiently and having one single source of truth and to get it very quickly and accurately.
The customer, we think, has a huge benefit to it, even outside of the other opportunities we see in the more product development side, whether it's our software side or it's in the actual development cycles within our instrumentation and our consumables and other critical products. So we see it from a couple of different ways. And Ignite's kind of the perfect way to actually take an enterprise approach and really prioritize and get deliberate results out of it.
Yeah. And maybe one last one on Ignite. I mean, the capital allocation piece for Agilent, I mean, the deal side has never been maybe one of the big strengths of the company. I know Ignite, you're kind of using that to maybe look at assets in a different way on the potential deal side, the integration piece. Maybe just quickly compare kind of the pre-Ignite, post-Ignite approach on capital allocation and how you guys are looking at deals.
I'll start with the.
And then I'll do the integration with the.
Yeah, exactly. So what I'd say, Patrick, is I think there's a couple of things here, right? So if you think about capital deployment, internal innovation, the capacity expansion, both at CDMO and for consumables, and then, of course, M&A are sort of the top tier of priority. And then in terms of the excess capital, we are certainly committed to anti-dilutive share repurchases at a minimum and the dividends, right? Now, I think when it comes to M&A, the idea here is we don't need a transformational deal to support our growth ambitions, but we remain open to looking at deals of all sizes, right? And there's certain areas, there's software, there's automation, there's specialty CDMO niches, there's high-growth adjacent technologies. All of that is within sort of the purview of how we are thinking about it.
But I think that that second part, which Tom can lean in on, is that we have turned the page in terms of our ability to integrate these assets versus what came before. And Tom, I'll hand it to you.
Yeah. I think the Ignite enterprise approach on the transformation is a perfect and operating model to really, and we were able to test this with BioVectra, by the way, right? And so we learned from that and saw some real success with that. We did it a couple of different ways. First of all, we viewed integration more strategically. Quite frankly, historically, it used to be a bit of an afterthought to the company. Now it's a very intentional part of the deal thesis, right? Because in order to do that, how are you going to resource it? How quickly are you going to be able to get your sources of value through that? And how are you going to be able to do it efficiently so it doesn't carry on for years and years? And so very careful, that's part of the upfront work we do.
At the same time, as opposed to the kind of the bottoms-up approach that we did before, this is a much more holistic approach, driving to the same set of numbers, one source of truth, and coordinating across the functions, along with the business. Because at times, we would have maybe historical differences between what the integration team would do versus actually what the business was driving towards, but ultimately, the business has to drive it and own it, and so we made major changes on that, and then finally, we're able to leverage many of the work streams, whether it's in the pricing, the procurement, a regional approach to manufacturing versus a site-by-site type of approach to it. We think all those added together really put us in a good operating model for taking on whatever size of opportunity is in front of us.
Okay. Last 30-second one, the tax rate, we got some questions when you guys guided, a lot of questions like, is this tax rate real? Maybe just quickly, why is the tax rate higher? Do we see as the year goes, could that come down? Maybe just a quick hit on the tax side.
Yeah. I don't know. Start off.
Yeah, Patrick, I would say, I mean, we do think it's a real number, right? I mean, and it's related to Pillar Two, OBBA regulations, right? And how those have been implemented and looking across our model and our portfolio of global entities, what we think the result will be. I mean, it is a one-time step up. I don't think, obviously, we'll continue to seek to optimize as things go forward and do what we can. But we think we understand this pretty well. And that'll be going forward, and we'll continue to work our best. I think if we look around the industry, there's not tons that are below 15%. And I know the one other that appears that does has a lot of other M&A and other things they can kind of, they can use to.
Yeah. I think an important aspect of our tax rate, when you see it, it's very close to our cash tax, right? So it's pretty clean, right? And so we don't have a lot of historical M&A and other things kind of flowing through. So you have a pretty clear look for that. Obviously, we're going to continue to look for opportunities to drive that down, but I think we have a good start, a fair starting point given the regulations out there. But at the same time, we're also, you can see our operating profit year-on-year, the high single digits growth. So we're going to continue to use Ignite and other factors in order to help mitigate that also.
Okay. Great. Thank you guys so much. Really appreciate it.
Good stuff, Patrick. Thank you.