Abbott has reaffirmed its FY25 guidance despite Q3 revenues falling short of analyst expectations, with strong performance across its medtech portfolio offset by sluggish performance in its diagnostics business.
The life sciences giant has now narrowed its anticipated FY25 growth to $5.12 to $5.18 per share, versus the previous range of $5.10 to $5.20.
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Wall Street analysts had expected Abbott to achieve Q3 revenues of $11.4bn. Narrowly missing expectations at $11.37bn prompted the company’s stock price to fall by 3.23% to a $129.45 close on 15 October.
Abbott’s stocks trade on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE).
The Chicago-headquartered company’s financials revealed a 6.6% decline in its Q3 diagnostics revenues to around $2.2bn globally, with modest growth in core laboratory, molecular, and point of care, at 3.8%, 2.6%, and 8.2%, respectively.
Abbott’s CEO, Robert B Ford said in an earnings call following the Q3 financial release that challenging market conditions in China impacting both price and volume remained “a headwind” for Abbott’s core lab diagnostic business, noting that, excluding China, core lab diagnostics grew 7%, with markets such as the US demonstrating an “acceleration in growth” in Q3 versus growth in the first half of 2025.
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By GlobalDataSeveral medtech companies have been experiencing lower sales volume in China, often as a result of President Trump’s scattershot approach to imposing tariffs on the nation.
According to GlobalData analysts, China’s March 2025 ban on the import of Illumina’s Next-Generation Sequencers (NGS) “pushes the downward motion” of Illumina in the Chinese market. Others in the medical device space struggling with China headwinds include Johnson and Johnson (J&J) MedTech, which has previously cited weakened demand from the nation as a result of anti-corruption drives by the Chinese Government and increased competition from local manufacturers.
This modest growth across lines in the segment was offset by a 27.3% drop-off in rapid testing, a segment that includes Covid-19 tests.
Covid-19 testing-related sales were $69m in the quarter, versus $265m in Q3 2024. The downturn is likely informed in part by the US Centres for Disease Control’s (CDC) waning support for widespread Covid-19 testing across the US.
Medtech businesses yield strong performance
Meanwhile, Abbott’s Q3 financials revealed strong performance across multiple lines in its medtech portfolio. The segment achieved sales of around $5.4bn, reflecting a 14.8% rise on Q3 2024.
Aside from Vascular and Neuromodulation, with growth of 6.6% and 7.6%, respectively, each of Abbott’s medtech lines saw double-digit growth.
The biggest growth area was seen in Diabetes Care at 19.3%, followed by Rhythm Management and Electrophysiology at 15% and 15.6%, respectively. Elsewhere, Heart Failure grew by 13.3% and Structural Heart by 11.3% versus the same period in 2024.
Ford highlighted during Abbott’s earnings call that the launch of its new Volt Pulsed Field Ablation (PFA) catheter in Europe, and its portfolio of ventricular assist devices and growth of Cardio MEMS implantable sensors used for the early detection of heart failure, contributed towards the overall medtech business’s performance.
In his closing remarks on Q3, Ford said the results demonstrated Abbott’s ability to deliver “consistent, high-quality performance”, citing its differentiated product pipeline as a key performance driver.
