Beckman shares drop on sales miss

Shares of Beckman Coulter Inc., a maker of medical diagnostic tests, fell after revenue missed analysts’ estimates because an equipment glitch delayed instrument production and university orders declined.

Beckman Coulter shares declined $2.47, or 3.4%, to $70.14, its biggest one-day fall since Aug. 9. Before Tuesday, Fullerton-based Beckman Coulter had risen 21% this year.

The company, which sells diagnostic devices and systems for automated testing in hospital, research and drug laboratories, said sales growth was hurt by fewer orders from academic research centers, which cut back because of less funding, particularly in Japan. The company also temporarily stopped making instruments used to analyze blood cells when it couldn’t get components.

“We had some planning errors. We’re catching up on that and we’ve got some significant back orders,” Chief Executive Scott Garrett said. “This certainly had an impact on our third-quarter results. We don’t expect it to affect our full year.”

Beckman Coulter reported that net income increased to $60 million, or 93 cents a share, from $47.4 million, or 74 cents, a year earlier. Sales increased 6% to $669 million, missing the $682.2-million average estimate of analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.

The results fell short of the company’s full-year revenue growth forecast of 7% to 9%. Beckman Coulter expects to meet its revenue target range by filling back orders for the cellular instruments, Garrett said. The company had about $10 million in back orders as of the end of the third quarter.

The company narrowed its forecast for full-year earnings excluding certain items to a range of $3.15 to $3.22 a share from $3.10 to $3.25 previously.