Head to Head Analysis: Alpha Teknova (NASDAQ:TKNO) vs. Twist Bioscience (NASDAQ:TWST)

Twist Bioscience (NASDAQ:TWST) and Alpha Teknova (NASDAQ:TKNO) are both healthcare companies, but which is the superior investment? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their dividends, risk, analyst recommendations, earnings, profitability, institutional ownership and valuation.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent recommendations for Twist Bioscience and Alpha Teknova, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Twist Bioscience	2	2	8	0	2.50
Alpha Teknova	1	1	3	0	2.40

Twist Bioscience currently has a consensus target price of $103.00, indicating a potential downside of 37.42%. Alpha Teknova has a consensus target price of $8.00, indicating a potential downside of 8.78%. Given Alpha Teknova’s higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Alpha Teknova is more favorable than Twist Bioscience.

Volatility and Risk

Twist Bioscience has a beta of 2.22, meaning that its share price is 122% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Alpha Teknova has a beta of 0.72, meaning that its share price is 28% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Twist Bioscience and Alpha Teknova”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Twist Bioscience	$376.57 million	27.41	-$77.67 million	($2.22)	-74.14
Alpha Teknova	$40.52 million	11.60	-$17.26 million	($0.31)	-28.29

Alpha Teknova has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Twist Bioscience. Twist Bioscience is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Alpha Teknova, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares Twist Bioscience and Alpha Teknova’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Twist Bioscience	-31.66%	-28.64%	-19.94%
Alpha Teknova	-38.37%	-24.94%	-16.53%

Insider & Institutional Ownership

13.8% of Alpha Teknova shares are held by institutional investors. 3.1% of Twist Bioscience shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 13.2% of Alpha Teknova shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Summary

Alpha Teknova beats Twist Bioscience on 8 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Twist Bioscience

Twist Bioscience Corporation engages in the manufacture and sale of synthetic DNA-based products. The company offers synthetic genes and gene fragments used in product development for therapeutics, diagnostics, chemicals/materials, food/agriculture, data storage, and various applications within academic research by biotech, pharma, industrial chemical, and agricultural companies, as well as academic labs; Oligo pools used in targeted NGS, CRISPR gene editing, mutagenesis experiments, DNA origami, DNA computing, data storage in DNA, and other applications; and immunoglobulin G proteins for customers focused on the pursuit of drug discovery and development. It also provides NGS tools comprising library preparation kits, human exome kits, and fixed and custom panels, as well as alliance panels, primarily used within diagnostic tests for various indications, population genetics research and biomarker discovery, translational research, microbiology, and applied markets research; and methylation detection kits for cancer, and rare and inherited disease study, as well as fast hybridization and full RNA sequencing workflow solution. In addition, the company provides synthetic SARS-CoV-2 RNA reference sequences as positive controls for the development of both NGS and reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction assays; synthetic monkeypox controls; and various respiratory viral controls, including for influenzas, respiratory syncytial virus, rhinoviruses, SARS, MERS, and coronaviruses. Further, it offers SARS-CoV-2 Research Panels, such as the Twist Respiratory Virus Panel and the Pan-Viral Research Panel, for the detection of disease in a research setting; precision DNA libraries used for antibody engineering, affinity maturation, and humanization; and antibody optimization solution to enable simultaneous optimization of multiple characteristics of a given antibody. The company was incorporated in 2013 and is headquartered in South San Francisco, California.

About Alpha Teknova

Alpha Teknova, Inc. produces critical reagents for the research, discovery, development, and commercialization of novel therapies, vaccines, and molecular diagnostics in the United States and internationally. The company offers pre-poured media plates for cell growth and cloning; liquid cell culture media and supplements for cellular expansion; and molecular biology reagents for sample manipulation, resuspension, and purification. It provides lab essentials which provides chemical formulations for use in biological research and drug discovery; and clinical solutions, a custom product used in the development and production of protein therapies, gene therapies, mRNA vaccines, and diagnostic kits. The company serves its products to life sciences market, including pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, contract development and manufacturing organizations, in vitro diagnostic franchises, as well as academic and government research institutions. Alpha Teknova, Inc. was founded in 1996 and is headquartered in Hollister, California.