Is Fisher & Paykel Healthcare's Tariff Playbook a Model for ANZ Medtech?

August 23, 2026

Why a record FY26, a two-year margin recovery plan and a banked tariff refund from a New Zealand device maker offer a framework for judging policy risk across Astra Capital's healthcare coverage

Executive Summary

Fisher & Paykel Healthcare Corporation Limited (NZX: FPH, ASX: FPH) delivered one of the stronger results in ASX and NZX healthcare for the 2026 financial year: operating revenue of NZ$2.31 billion, up 14 per cent, and net profit after tax of NZ$468.5 million, up 24 per cent. It did so while absorbing a new and genuinely uncertain cost, US tariffs on hospital products manufactured in New Zealand, and while roughly 60 per cent of its US-bound Mexican production had to be re-tested for USMCA compliance. Two days before this paper's publication date, the company went further: it disclosed it expects to bank NZ$23 million of refunded US tariffs in the 2027 financial year and lifted its FY27 profit guidance to a range of NZ$525 million to NZ$565 million.

This paper is not a call on Fisher & Paykel Healthcare shares. FPH is a large-cap, dual-listed medical device manufacturer, well outside Astra Capital's lower mid-market mandate, and Astra Capital does not hold a position in the company. We use FPH here as a sector bellwether: a listed, transparent proxy for how a well-run ANZ healthcare device business absorbs trade-policy shocks, protects gross margin discipline, and keeps investing in R&D through a multi-year disruption. That question matters directly for Astra Capital's own healthcare, wellness and beauty, and consumer portfolio, several of which carry cross-border manufacturing or supply exposure of their own.

The paper sets out FPH's FY26 result and the tariff mechanics behind it, places the company against its closest listed comparator, ResMed, and against the broader wave of 2025-2026 medtech M&A, and looks at Southeast Asia's growing role as a medtech manufacturing base, an alternative reference point to FPH's New Zealand and Mexico dual-hub model. It closes with a practical framework, not a prediction, for how we will read commentary at FPH's Annual Shareholders' Meeting on 25 August 2026, and for how a similar framework can be applied to policy risk anywhere in Astra Capital's coverage.

Introduction

A note on fit before we begin. Astra Capital's mandate is lower mid-market, founder-owned businesses across Australia, New Zealand and Southeast Asia. Fisher & Paykel Healthcare is neither: it is a global large-cap medical device manufacturer with a market capitalisation in the order of NZ$20 billion, dual-listed on the NZX and ASX, and the largest company on the New Zealand sharemarket. We include it in the Astra Capital Insights series as a listed-market read on our healthcare sector thesis and as an ANZ medtech bellwether, not as a template for the private, control-oriented transactions that make up the majority of our portfolio. Readers should keep that distinction in mind throughout.

Fisher & Paykel Healthcare designs, manufactures and markets products for acute and chronic respiratory care, surgery, and the treatment of obstructive sleep apnea, selling into more than 120 countries through two segments: Hospital (respiratory humidification, nasal high flow therapy, and a fast-growing anaesthesia and surgical applications line) and Homecare (CPAP devices, masks and accessories for sleep apnea). Around 40 per cent of revenue is US-derived, and the company manufactures across two hubs, roughly 55 per cent of volume in New Zealand and 45 per cent in Mexico, a structure that has been both a source of resilience and, since early 2025, the company's single largest policy-risk exposure.

The thesis of this paper is straightforward: FPH's FY26 result and its FY27 guidance upgrade show that a genuinely disciplined, long-duration operator can absorb a material, government-imposed cost shock, keep gross margin recovery on track within one to two years rather than see it derailed, and continue to compound R&D investment and market share through the disruption. Whether that same resilience holds for smaller, less diversified healthcare manufacturers in Astra Capital's own coverage, particularly those with concentrated US exposure or single-country manufacturing, is the open question this paper is designed to help readers think through, using FPH's disclosed numbers as the worked example.

FY26 in Numbers: A Record Year Set Against Policy Noise

FPH's FY26 result, released 26 May 2026, came in ahead of the company's own upgraded guidance. Operating revenue reached NZ$2.31 billion, a 14 per cent increase on FY25 (12 per cent in constant currency), and net profit after tax rose 24 per cent to NZ$468.5 million (28 per cent in constant currency). Shares rose roughly 9 per cent on the day. R&D investment held at 10 per cent of revenue, or NZ$235.5 million, and the board lifted the final dividend 38 per cent to 33.0 cents per share, taking the full-year dividend to 52.0 cents, a 22 per cent increase on FY25.

Exhibit 1: Revenue and NPAT growth accelerated through FY26 and are guided to continue through FY27.

The growth was broad-based but Hospital-led. Hospital revenue rose 18 per cent to NZ$1.51 billion (15 per cent constant currency), with new applications consumables, the anaesthesia and surgical product lines that management has spent a decade building clinical acceptance for, up 18 per cent (16 per cent constant currency) and now representing the majority of Hospital consumables revenue. Homecare grew more modestly, up 8 per cent to NZ$802.7 million (7 per cent constant currency), with OSA mask revenue growth cooling to 7 per cent as the initial boost from the Solo mask range's US launch normalised.

Exhibit 2: Hospital, the higher-margin, more clinically entrenched segment, is doing the heavier lifting.

Management's own framing is instructive: CEO Lewis Gradon described FY26 growth as "uncommon" and cautioned the company does "not take it for granted", language consistent with a management team that has, by its own account, run the business on a 15-year planning horizon rather than reacting to any single year's results.

The Tariff Playbook: Nairobi Protocol, USMCA and the Two-Year Margin Recovery

FPH's tariff exposure is a useful case study precisely because the company disclosed it early, quantified it specifically, and updated the market repeatedly as the position developed, a level of granularity smaller, less-covered manufacturers rarely provide voluntarily. In February 2025, when the US announced a 25 per cent tariff on non-USMCA-compliant Mexican imports and a 10 per cent tariff on Chinese imports, FPH disclosed that roughly 45 per cent of its volume was made in Mexico and 55 per cent in New Zealand, with about 60 per cent of US volumes supplied from Mexico. The company subsequently confirmed that practically all of its Mexican-manufactured finished goods are USMCA-compliant and therefore largely exempt from the Mexico tariff line, and that its Homecare (OSA) products are separately exempt under the Nairobi Protocol, an international agreement providing duty-free treatment for goods designed for people with disabilities.

What was left, after those two exemptions, was a 10 per cent US tariff on Hospital products manufactured in New Zealand. Management quantified the net gross margin impact at approximately 75 basis points spread over two financial years, 50 basis points in FY26 and 25 basis points in FY27, and stated this would add roughly one to two years to the company's path back to its long-run 65 per cent gross margin target (FY25 gross margin was 62.9 per cent). The company's response was not to relocate manufacturing but to lean on its existing continuous improvement program, targeting roughly 100 basis points of annual gross margin gains through efficiency to offset the tariff drag over time.

Exhibit 3: FPH quantified the tariff drag early and specifically rather than leaving the market to guess.

The most recent development reinforces the read-through. On 21 August 2026, four days before the AGM, FPH disclosed it expects to bank NZ$23 million of refunded US tariffs during FY27 and lifted its FY27 NPAT guidance to NZ$525 million to NZ$565 million (from NZ$500 million to NZ$550 million), with revenue guidance nudged to NZ$2.47 billion to NZ$2.57 billion. The refund reflects a US Supreme Court ruling on the legality of certain tariff actions; within hours of that ruling the White House reimposed duties under alternative legislation, and a separate 12.5 per cent tariff applied to most New Zealand goods entering the US from 24 July 2026. FPH itself can name a specific refund figure because it sells into the US through its own subsidiary and cleared the relevant goods directly, a structural advantage smaller exporters selling through third-party distributors typically do not have.

Regional Deep Dive: ANZ Manufacturing and the Rise of Southeast Asian Medtech Supply

FPH's dual-hub model, New Zealand for Hospital products and higher-complexity manufacturing, Mexico (primarily Tijuana) for US-proximate Homecare volume, has been central to both its resilience and its tariff exposure. The company has continued to invest in that base regardless: FY26 capital expenditure guidance included roughly NZ$225 million directed largely at its East Tāmaki campus in Auckland, and management has stated both facilities retain spare capacity to flex volumes if required. That is a distinctly ANZ-manufacturing story, and one that stands in some contrast to where the rest of the medtech industry is placing incremental capacity.

Southeast Asia is increasingly the region device manufacturers look to for that incremental capacity. Singapore hosts more than 500 medtech companies and functions as the region's premium device market and distribution hub, drawing an estimated US$25 billion in R&D-related funding activity. Malaysia is a leading global producer of catheters and medical gloves and has continued to attract foreign investment under its New Industrial Master Plan 2030, while Indonesia's medical device market is projected to nearly double from roughly US$3.5 billion in 2021 to US$6.5 billion in 2026 as the country pushes to reduce import reliance. Special economic zones in Malaysia's Johor-Singapore corridor, Vietnam's Saigon Hi-Tech Park and Indonesia's Batam Free Trade Zone are all explicitly marketed at medtech manufacturers pursuing supply-chain diversification, the so-called "China plus one" logic that has accelerated since 2025.

For Astra Capital's own healthcare and consumer portfolio, this regional dynamic cuts two ways. It offers a genuine diversification option for founder-owned manufacturers currently concentrated in a single country, echoing FPH's own dual-hub logic at a smaller scale. But FPH's experience is also a caution against assuming any single relocation solves policy risk outright: the company's Mexico exposure, chosen originally for proximity to the US market, became a tariff question in its own right within a matter of weeks in early 2025, and New Zealand-based Hospital manufacturing, the segment doing the most growth, remains the exposed leg of the business. There is no manufacturing geography that is durably immune to trade policy; the more relevant variable, as FPH demonstrates, is whether a business has the margin structure, customer relationships, and balance sheet to absorb a shock while it works out the next move.

Duopoly Dynamics: FPH, ResMed and the Medtech M&A Backdrop

FPH's closest listed comparator is ResMed (NYSE: RMD, ASX: RMD), and the two are frequently, if imperfectly, compared by ANZ investors given their dual ASX listings and shared respiratory care exposure. The businesses are less substitutable than the comparison suggests. ResMed is the dominant global player in home sleep apnea therapy, holding an estimated 55 to 60 per cent share of the CPAP mask market and generating roughly US$5 billion in FY25 revenue at operating margins near 28 per cent, built substantially on its position as the primary beneficiary of Philips Respironics' multi-year product recall. FPH's strength sits more in Hospital-based respiratory support, particularly humidification systems used in critical care, and in Homecare mask comfort rather than outright CPAP device share; independent analysis has characterised FPH as ResMed's strongest premium competitor on comfort and hospital-grade humidification rather than a direct scale rival.

That difference in composition is visible in capital allocation. ResMed closed a US$340 million acquisition of Noctrix Health in June 2026, extending into restless legs syndrome therapy, and separately agreed to sell its MatrixCare software business for roughly US$490 million cash to refocus around its core sleep and breathing franchise, a deliberate narrowing of scope after several years of software-adjacent acquisitions. FPH, by contrast, has made no comparable acquisitions in the period and has instead directed capital toward organic R&D and its own manufacturing footprint, a lower-variance, lower-optionality strategy that FY26's result suggests has been working on its own terms.

The wider medtech M&A backdrop underscores how episodic and large-scale dealmaking has become elsewhere in the sector: Boston Scientific's approximately US$14.5 billion agreed acquisition of Penumbra, Medtronic's approximately US$650 million deal for SPR Therapeutics, and Prestige Consumer Healthcare's roughly US$1.045 billion purchase of the Breathe Right nasal-strip brand all closed or were announced within the same window as FPH's FY26 result. Disclosed medtech M&A value exceeded US$80 billion in 2025 alone. Set against that backdrop, FPH's organic-growth, balance-sheet-funded approach is the outlier, not the norm, in its sector, a distinction worth noting for any lower mid-market healthcare business in Astra Capital's coverage weighing organic reinvestment against a bolt-on acquisition strategy of its own.

Dimension	ResMed (RMD)	Fisher & Paykel Healthcare (FPH)
Global positioning	Dominant in home CPAP/sleep apnea; ~55-60% mask share	Leading Hospital humidification; premium Homecare comfort challenger
FY25/FY26 revenue scale	~US$5.0bn (FY25)	NZ$2.31bn / ~US$1.4bn (FY26)
Recent capital allocation	Bolt-on M&A (Noctrix); divesting non-core software (MatrixCare)	Organic R&D and manufacturing capex; no acquisitions disclosed
Primary policy exposure	Limited direct tariff disclosure to date	Quantified NZ tariff drag; USMCA/Nairobi Protocol exemptions secured
R&D intensity	Not separately disclosed at comparable granularity	~10% of revenue (NZ$235.5m, FY26)

Table 1: FPH and ResMed compete in adjacent, not identical, segments of respiratory care.

Risks and Counterpoints

A paper built entirely around a strong result is marketing, not research. Four risks are worth holding alongside FPH's FY26 numbers.

Trade policy remains genuinely unresolved. The tariff position has already changed direction multiple times within eighteen months: an initial announcement, a USMCA compliance clarification, a Nairobi Protocol exemption, a Supreme Court ruling, a same-day reimposition under different legislation, and a new 12.5 per cent tariff applied from July 2026. FPH's NZ$23 million refund and upgraded guidance reflect the most recent turn of that cycle, not a settled outcome. A less favourable ruling, a further legislative route, or a change in New Zealand's tariff treatment specifically could reopen the margin question the company believes it has largely worked through.

GLP-1 drugs are a structural, not cyclical, question for obesity-linked device demand. Obstructive sleep apnea is strongly comorbid with obesity, and industry commentary increasingly flags GLP-1 weight-loss therapies as a potential structural headwind to device utilisation across obesity-linked segments, including sleep apnea. This risk sits primarily with the Homecare franchise rather than Hospital, but Homecare growth already cooled to 8 per cent in FY26 from 13 per cent in FY25, and disentangling normal post-launch normalisation from an emerging GLP-1 effect is not yet possible from disclosed data.

Currency and concentration. Roughly 40 per cent of group revenue is US-dollar-denominated against a New Zealand dollar cost base, and FY26's underlying NPAT growth of 24 per cent compares to 28 per cent in constant currency, meaning currency movements were already a modest drag even in a strong year. A materially different NZD/USD path than the 31 January 2026 rates management guided from (NZD:USD 0.60) would move both reported growth and the effective size of any further tariff refund.

Valuation already reflects a favourable read. Shares rose roughly 9 per cent on the FY26 result and traded through a range of roughly NZ$35 to NZ$38.50 in the months either side of it, alongside broker fair value estimates that have themselves been revised both up and down through 2026 on shifting growth, margin and discount rate assumptions, including at least one instance of the stock being removed from a regional broker conviction list. A bellwether case for operational resilience is not the same as a case that the market has not already priced a substantial share of the good news into the stock.

A Framework for Reading Policy Risk in ANZ Healthcare Investments

FPH's Annual Shareholders' Meeting falls on 25 August 2026, two days after this paper's publication date. Consistent with our house approach to imminent, price-sensitive events, we do not predict what management will say or how the market will react. Instead, the checklist below sets out what we will be listening for at the AGM, and it is written to generalise: the same four questions are the ones we would ask of any founder-owned healthcare or consumer manufacturer in Astra Capital's own coverage carrying cross-border supply or tariff exposure.

Is the tariff position genuinely stabilising, or is management simply reporting the most recent favourable turn in a cycle that has reversed direction before? Listen for language about the durability of the USMCA and Nairobi Protocol exemptions specifically, not just the net bps figure.
Is margin recovery being funded by real efficiency gains or by one-off items? A tariff refund is real cash but not a repeatable offset; the 100 bps annual continuous-improvement target is the metric that indicates a structural fix.
Is segment growth broadening or narrowing? Hospital, not Homecare, has carried FY26; a healthcare bellwether should be able to explain why, and whether that mix shift is durable or reflects a specific, temporary GLP-1 or post-launch effect in Homecare.
Is capital allocation staying disciplined? FPH has not chased M&A through this disruption; a shift toward acquisitions, particularly outside the core respiratory category, would be a signal worth testing against the ResMed comparison set out above.

Applied more broadly, the same four questions, policy durability, the quality of margin offsets, the breadth of growth, and capital allocation discipline under pressure, form a reusable lens for judging any Astra Capital portfolio company navigating tariff, currency or regulatory disruption, well beyond this single listed name.

Conclusion

Fisher & Paykel Healthcare's FY26 result, and the tariff refund and guidance upgrade that followed it in August, do not resolve the underlying trade-policy uncertainty the company and its ANZ manufacturing peers continue to face. What they do demonstrate is that a business with genuine pricing power, a decade-plus product-adoption cycle in its higher-margin Hospital segment, and a management team willing to disclose granular, specific numbers rather than vague reassurance, can absorb a real cost shock without it derailing growth or long-run margin targets by more than a year or two. That is the bellwether lesson for Astra Capital's broader ANZ and Southeast Asian healthcare coverage: geography alone does not solve policy risk, but margin structure, customer entrenchment and balance sheet discipline meaningfully determine how much of that risk a business can absorb before it shows up in the numbers investors actually see.

Position and Conflict of Interest Disclosure

Astra Capital Proprietary Limited does not currently hold a position in Fisher & Paykel Healthcare Corporation Limited (NZX: FPH, ASX: FPH).

This paper is published as general sector bellwether and listed-market read-across content for Astra Capital's healthcare coverage. It is not a position thesis and should not be read as a statement of Astra Capital's investment intentions with respect to Fisher & Paykel Healthcare or any other listed security. Nothing in this paper should be read as investment advice, a recommendation, or a solicitation to transact in Fisher & Paykel Healthcare securities or any other security. See the Disclaimer below.

Call to Connect

Astra Capital partners with founder-owned businesses across healthcare, wellness and beauty, consumer, and specialty retail in Australia, New Zealand and Southeast Asia. If your business is navigating cross-border manufacturing, trade-policy exposure, or a capital allocation decision of the kind discussed in this paper, we would welcome the conversation. Reach the team via astracapital.com/connect.

References

Fisher & Paykel Healthcare, "FPH reports strong revenue and profit growth for FY26", NZX announcement, 26 May 2026. https://www.nzx.com/announcements/473285
Fisher & Paykel Healthcare, "FPH updates FY26 revenue and earnings guidance", NZX announcement, 23 February 2026. https://www.nzx.com/announcements/467924
Fisher & Paykel Healthcare, "New US tariffs announced today", investor news release, 3 April 2025. https://www.fphcare.com/us/corporate/news/new-us-tariffs-announced-today/
Fisher & Paykel Healthcare, "Costs forecast to increase under new US tariff regime", investor news release, 3 February 2025. https://www.fphcare.com/us/corporate/news/costs-forecast-to-increase-under-new-us-tariff-regime/
Fisher & Paykel Healthcare, "FPH to announce full year results on 26 May 2026", NZX announcement, 15 April 2026. https://www.fphcare.com/nz/corporate/investor/news/fph-to-announce-full-year-results-on-26-may-2026/
Fisher & Paykel Healthcare, Investor Information / financial calendar, accessed August 2026. https://www.fphcare.com/us/corporate/investor/
Newswire, "Fisher and Paykel Healthcare banks $23 million of refunded US tariffs and lifts its profit forecast", 21 August 2026. https://newswire.co.nz/2026/08/fisher-paykel-healthcare-tariff-refund-profit-guidance/
FNArena, "Fisher & Paykel Healthcare's Tariffs Annoyance", 4 June 2025. https://fnarena.com/index.php/2025/06/04/fisher-paykel-healthcares-tariffs-annoyance/
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MDDIOnline, "MedTech CDMOs in Southeast Asia: Landscape Overview and Investment Opportunities", L.E.K. Consulting, 14 May 2026. https://www.lek.com/insights/hea/sea/ei/medtech-cdmos-southeast-asia-landscape-overview-and-investment-opportunities
Xtalks, "MedTech M&A in 2026: Tracking Deal Activity", updated 9 June 2026. https://xtalks.com/medtech-ma-in-2026-tracking-deal-activity-4616/
MedDeviceGuide, "Biggest Medical Device M&A Deals of 2025-2026: Complete Tracker", 12 April 2026. https://meddeviceguide.com/blog/biggest-medical-device-mna-deals-2025-2026-tracker
MDDIOnline, "ResMed closes strong fiscal 2026 with plans to shed software business", August 2026. https://www.mddionline.com/medical-device-markets/resmed-closes-strong-fiscal-2026-with-plans-to-shed-software-business
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Disclaimer

This white paper is provided for general informational purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, legal or tax advice, nor an offer, solicitation or recommendation in respect of any security, fund or transaction. Views expressed are those of Astra Capital Proprietary Limited ACN 691553849 at the time of publication and may change without notice. Information sourced from third parties is believed to be reliable but has not been independently verified and no warranty is given as to its accuracy or completeness. Past performance and industry trends are not indicative of future results. Readers should seek independent professional advice before making any investment decision.

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