3D Printing Financials: Markforged FY2021 Beat Expectations, Upbeat Guidance for 2022

Shares of Markforged (NYSE: MKFG) escalated in after-hours trading Wednesday after the company announced better-than-expected fourth-quarter and full-year earnings and anticipated revenue growth of 30% for 2022. Furthermore, on the opening bell on March 16, 2022, the 3D printer manufacturer’s stock was up more than 8.7% and continued to climb, reaching $3.75 by midday.

During an earnings call with investors, Markforged CEO Shai Terem said 2021 was a tremendous growth year for the company and highlighted the potential for scalable growth mainly due to the AI-driven cloud software platform, which connects Markforged’s global fleet of printers.

“We executed on the plan we shared a year ago and beat our targets for 2021, making Markforged one of the fastest organically growing additive manufacturing companies, with industry-leading gross margins,” pointed out Terem. “We exceeded our guidance for both the quarter and the full year resulting in 27% annual organic growth with 58% gross margins. Markforged was founded on the premise that additive technologies can create a paradigm shift in how we as humans manufacture products. Markforged is building the largest network of connected digital factories to lead the future of distributed manufacturing.”

Markforged team led by CEO Shai Terem at the NYSE for the company’s public debut. Image courtesy of NYSE.

During the fourth quarter of 2021, the firm delivered $26.6 million in revenue, a 9.5% year-over-year increase. This brings total revenue for 2021 to $91.2 million, an uptick of 27% from $71.9 million in 2020, mainly thanks to growth across all products and services and across all geographic regions. Its net loss for 2021 came in at $61.0 million, marking significantly wider losses than the prior year of $17.7 million. However, net profit for the year was $3.8 million, or 4 cents per share, up from last year’s net loss of $18 million, or 49 cents per share.

Thanks to several new product launches, most notably the FX20 with ULTEM 9085 filament with continuous fiber reinforcement, the company continued to expand the addressable market of its Digital Forge solution, an integrated metal and carbon fiber AM platform designed to solve high-value, mission-critical applications.

Built to scale distributed global production, the FX20 empowers Markforged customers to move their additive operations into robust production with strong, accurate parts that solve demanding, end-use applications. Released in November 2021, the FX20 is described as the biggest, fastest, and smartest 3D printer Markforged has ever produced.

“We are seeing robust demand from our customers for this solution and building a strong backlog all over the world,” Terem told investors. “The early excitement for the FX20 and ULTEM Filament validates our view, the need for high strength heat resistant and higher performance parts in demanding industries, such as aerospace, defense and automotive.”

The executive revealed that one of the world’s leading automotive manufacturers who use the full offering of the Digital Forge across its operation almost doubled their connected fleet to over 40 printers last quarter, including an FX20 with over 700 hours of printing time. He also expects a significant increase in the volume of FX20 shipping in the second half of the year as accelerated adoption continues to certify more and more applications with the Digital Forge.

“This is a strong example of our customers extending its usage of our printer and the application they’re solving. They are even overcoming supply chain destruction by printing as needed and using parts that go directly into the cars, the manufacturer. As the customers increase their use of the Digital Forge, we are expanding our addressable market and tapping new applications from accessible product design with our new precise PLA to higher and robust production with the FX20 and ULTEM 9085 filament with continuous fiber reinforcement,” commented Terem.

Markforged has the world’s largest connected fleet of industrial 3D printers after the launch of its Digital Forge platform. Image courtesy of Markforged.

Focused on developing multiple products simultaneously to accelerate the growth of Digital Forge’s addressable market, Markforged nearly doubled its team with now roughly 400 employees, including several key executive hires like Andrew Hally as Chief Marketing Officer. In addition, since announcing the relocation to new global headquarters in Waltham, Massachusetts, the company has been hiring employees for its new 120,000 square feet office that can house up to 500 people. At the time of the announcement, Terem said Markforged plans to add employees “across the board next year,” referring to 2022 when the move is expected to be complete.

As for future guidance, company management remains confident that Markforged will achieve its targets again in 2022. The company estimates revenue in the range of $114 million and $123 million for 2022, representing year-over-year growth of 30% at the midpoint of that range. In addition, Chief Financial Officer Mark Schwartz said he expects the company to continue generating industry-leading gross margins, even factoring in the global supply chain challenges with full-year non-GAAP gross margin expected to be in the range of 55% to 57%.

With over 12,000 active printers, which have printed more than 11 million parts, Markforged’s flagship platform, the Digital Forge, is expected to help many companies by combining hardware, software, and materials to solve supply chain problems right at the point of need. Committed to research and development efforts to expand the value of the Digital Forge platform, Markforged remains one of the leading companies in the 3D printing industry.