US Life Science Tools & Diagnostics: Notes from the road - Feedback from 80 investors in 8 days (and thoughts into the quarter)

This note summarizes takeaways from roughly 80 meetings in eight days across Europe and Canada and offers thoughts into the quarter for US Life Science Tools & Diagnostics. The sector is up about 30% since coverage was relaunched at the end of June, while fundamentals have improved only moderately. About 65% of investors view the move as overdone, attributing it mainly to rotation into healthcare and other portfolio-construction goals; about 35% remain believers, most driven by AI optimism and citing Roche's Pharma Day 2026 productivity data, while some are pricing in a recovery in academic and government end markets. Bernstein maintains Outperform ratings on Waters, Agilent, Guardant and Natera, and Market-Perform ratings on Thermo Fisher, Illumina, Avantor and Revvity. Its bottom-up model implies about 5% organic growth for Thermo Fisher in 3Q, above the company's 4% guidance and 4.2% consensus but still below buy-side expectations.