Strata is no longer the passenger aviation story that listed as Blade. After selling that unit to Joby Aviation and buying Keystone Perfusion, the public company is a transplant logistics and clinical-services platform trying to prove that one-call organ recovery can throw off cash. The second-quarter print is the first clean look at that mix working in the same direction: Clinical sequential growth funded a guidance raise even as Logistics slowed. The investment debate is whether that Clinical mix is durable enough to carry a still-thin cash balance and a GAAP loss that is still being distorted by deal accounting.
Revenue rose to $72.5 million. That is a sixty percent jump from the year-ago quarter, but most of the lift is the Clinical book that did not exist in the year-ago print. Logistics, the organic franchise, grew only high-single digits as one non-exclusive customer cut flying and trip distances shortened. Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, management's preferred operating-profit measure, reached $7.9 million. The margin is now double digits, yet Logistics gross margin slipped as fuel and unscheduled maintenance bit. The operating engine is improving; the original air-logistics franchise is not the growth story anymore.
Free cash flow before aircraft purchases was $2.9 million, the second straight quarter of cash generation, and management lifted full-year sales and operating-profit guidance. The same quarter still produced a continuing-operations net loss because brand-integration amortization and earn-out revaluations hit the GAAP line. Cash and short-term investments ended near $23 million after $35 million of bolt-on cash. The next few quarters decide whether Clinical compounding and the Statline organ-placement handoff offset a Logistics volume hole of roughly three percent and a cash pile that is already small relative to the deal pipeline.