US Life Science Tools & Diagnostics: Monthly sector health tracker (August data)

We publish a monthly life science tools & diagnostics sector health tracker to aggregate 1) qualitative commentary from major events, and 2) quantitative data that can help us assess market trends and sentiments. From a qualitative perspective, commentary at September conferences is trending positive (with the sector up meaningfully in the last few days). From a quantitative perspective, August sector health metrics are mixed: drug approvals and pharma & biotech generally continued to stay strong, while academic & government (both federal and international) was roughly flat to down. The cleanest positives: New drug approvals increased again, while clinical trial starts stabilized sequentially after July's decline (and was up comfortably YoY). Biotech funding also remained broadly steady at an elevated level and is now up 67% on a TTM basis. The most misleading negative: Licensing deal value declined again sequentially, but remains up 40% on a TTM basis, suggesting that the monthly weak