Quest Diagnostics began in 1967 as Metropolitan Pathology Laboratory, founded by Dr. Paul A. Brown on the idea that centralized, automated testing could serve physicians faster and more cheaply than small local labs. Renamed MetPath in 1969, it was acquired by Corning Glass Works in 1982 and spun off as the independent Quest Diagnostics on December 31, 1996.
Building national scale
Quest grew mainly through acquisitions: SmithKline Beecham Clinical Laboratories in 1999, Unilab in 2003, LabOne in 2005, AmeriPath in 2007 and Solstas in 2014. Together with Labcorp, it is one of two national independent lab companies in the United States. It also competes with thousands of hospital labs.
COVID-19 and the reset
COVID-19 testing lifted revenue to $10.79B in 2021. Revenue fell to $9.25B in 2023 as that demand faded. Quest then rebuilt growth with hospital outreach deals and the 2024 LifeLabs acquisition in Canada, reaching $11.035B of revenue in 2025.
2026: volume-led growth
In Q2 2026, revenue rose 10.2% to $3.04B and requisition volume grew 13.1%, while revenue per requisition fell 2.8%. Quest raised FY2026 revenue guidance to $11.95B-$12.05B. It credited physician, hospital and consumer channels, the Corewell Health and Fresenius collaborations, and advanced tests such as AD-Detect and Haystack MRD.
