Bio-Reference Laboratories, Inc. Reports 168% Increase in Pre-Tax Income and 20% Increase in Revenue for Fiscal 2002.

Business Editors

ELMWOOD PARK, N.J.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 9, 2003

Company Achieves Record Breaking Pre-Tax Profits on Record Revenues

Bio-Reference Laboratories, Inc. (NASDAQ: BRLI) announced today pre-tax net income for the 2002 fiscal year of $5,222,539, compared to pre-tax net income of $1,947,749 for the prior fiscal year, an increase of 168%. Pre-tax earnings were $.41 per share on a fully diluted basis compared to $.17 per share the prior year. Net revenues for the 2002 fiscal year were $96,630,704 compared to net revenues of $80,621,852 for fiscal year 2001. Fully taxed net income for the 2002 fiscal year was $4,921,539, or $.39 per share on a fully diluted basis, versus the prior year net income of $2,361,749 and $.21 per share. The margin for gross profit on revenues remained constant at 48% for the second consecutive quarter and improved to 46% for the current year. Operating income for the current year was $6,071,993 compared to $3,607,786 for the prior fiscal year. Year over year, net revenues grew by 20%, extending the Company's compound annual growth rate of 20% for net revenue into a ninth year. On October 31, 2002 working capital was $12,650,761 compared to $7,257,169 at the end of fiscal year 2001; in addition, during fiscal year 2002 the Company generated cash from operations of $4,682,014 an increase of $3,087,772 over the prior fiscal year. Patient count increased by 15% from 1,696,240 in fiscal year 2001 to 1,944,031 in fiscal year 2002.

The fourth quarter of fiscal year 2002 represented the seventh consecutive quarter in which the Company posted record profits and the fifteenth consecutive quarter of record revenues. Gross profit increased by 26% to $12,298,846 in the fourth quarter of the current year over $9,761,741 in the prior year quarter. In the fourth quarter of fiscal 2002, the Company reported record net income before taxes of $1,626,944, an increase of 131% over the $703,404 reported in the prior fiscal year on record quarterly revenues of $25,579,377 compared to prior year quarterly revenues of $21,235,404. Pre-tax earnings per share for the quarter on a fully diluted basis rose to $.13 per share compared with the prior year's $.06 per share.

The Company made several significant announcements over the course of fiscal year 2002. Effective March 26, 2002, Bio-Reference commenced trading on The Nasdaq (R) National Market. In August, the Company announced the appointment of Maria Pedemonte, MD, as Chief Medical Officer and in October the Company announced that it had established a new Hemostasis and Thrombophilia Laboratory headed up by Dr. Yale Arkel, one of the world's leading authorities in the field. The appointment of Dr. Pedemonte and the new laboratory are key components of the Company's announced strategy to provide focused marketing efforts in specialty markets. The Company announced the hiring of John Littleton, a former Quest and Specialty Laboratories Sales Director as Vice President of Sales. CareEvolve, the Company's connectivity solution, announced a strategic marketing agreement with Roche Diagnostics in January, 2002. During the past year, the joint venture with Roche has been put into operations and in November announced a significant contract with S.E.D Medical Laboratories of Albuquerque, NM, and Ardent Health Systems which allows for the CareEvolve solution to be made available to S.E.D clients. In November, Bio-Reference announced that PSIMedica, the Bio-Reference Laboratories informatics business unit, has formed a strategic alliance with ML Holdings that has resulted in a three year contract for ML Holdings to provide the PSIMedica Clinical Knowledge Management system to a major Ohio payor.

Marc D. Grodman M.D., President and Chief Executive Officer commented, "The dramatic improvement in our financial results for fiscal 2002 are the fruits of our goal to be a fierce competitor in the laboratory industry and our determination to be one of the premier full service labs in the country. We are constantly looking to expand our parameters where we can and not to be a laboratory bound by transactions or short term relationships. Instead we work steadfastly at being more than a laboratory and providing better, more efficient healthcare to patients and more valuable service to our clients. Our robust prison business and our focused specialty market services in oncology, molecular diagnostics and hematology allow us to expand our geographical boundaries and our infrastructure allows us to fully service this ever expanding geographical area. We remain broadly diversified in our testing menu, which better equips us to handle the volatile reimbursement environment and changing markets. However, as we clearly stated in the announcement of our new Coagulation laboratory, we are intent on growing our specialty market business."

Dr. Grodman continued, "We believe that we are different than other clinical laboratories. We have built a strong regional franchise upon which we grow our business. That regional business provides us with an infrastructure platform upon which we have built a diverse menu of tests that enable us to generate our focused market for specialty testing; esoteric testing now represents 25% of our total net revenues. We grow through expansion, technology and informatics. In the past year we substantially expanded our use of FISH technology and we started a coagulation laboratory; we were able to do so because our infrastructure supports these testing methodologies and methods and the technology was available for us to implement these advanced testing capabilities. We are now able to incorporate laboratory results data in our PSIMedica informatics solution; this enables us to offer value-added services that distinguish us from other laboratories. We use our focused marketing specialties to expand the footprint of our routine testing market area. With the hiring of John Littleton and Yale Arkel and the promotion of Maria Pedemonte, we have signaled the fact that we will seek the best and the finest laboratory personnel available in order to grow our business. We seek strategic marketing relationships with partners that need our distribution capability to market their products. Our long-term strategic approach has enabled us to survive in a highly competitive market. Our resolve is to continue to grow our market share and to constantly seek new and better ways to use technology and informatics to improve the value of our clinical laboratory operations."

The Company's year-end earnings conference call is scheduled for today at 10:30 a.m. Eastern Standard Time. The live audio Web cast will be available at the Company's corporate Web site, and through www.streetevents.com. To listen to the call please go to either Web site ten minutes before the conference call is scheduled to begin. You will need to register as well as download and install any necessary audio software. The Web cast will be archived, on both Web sites, for 30 days following the call.

About Bio-Reference Laboratories, Inc.

The Company is the largest independent regional clinical laboratory in the Northeast and has major market positions in physician offices, nursing homes and correctional institutions. The Company is a full service clinical laboratory with specialty capability, especially in the areas of genomics, oncology, correctional health, and complimentary medicine. PSIMedica, a business unit of the Company, is a clinical knowledge management (CKM) organization offering an array of information solutions for reducing healthcare costs and improving quality performance based on a flexible, scalable software analytical engine that utilizes all available source information, including claims data, enrollment data, prescription data and laboratory data. The Company provides a comprehensive connectivity solution to physicians that includes disease management, laboratory reporting and ordering, as well as claims and eligibility processing through CareEvolve, its web-based healthcare portal.

                   Bio-Reference Laboratories, Inc.
                       Statements of Operations
                              (Unaudited)

                           Years Ended          Three Months Ended
                             Oct 31,                 Oct 31,
                        2002         2001        2002        2001
                    -----------  -----------  ----------- -----------
Net Revenues        $96,630,704  $80,621,852  $25,579,377 $21,235,404
Cost of Sales        51,705,626   44,263,599   13,280,531  11,473,663
Gross Profit
 on Revenues        $44,925,078  $36,358,253  $12,298,846  $9,761,741
General and
 Administrative      38,853,085   32,750,467   10,512,088   8,716,208
Operating Income     $6,071,993   $3,607,786   $1,786,758  $1,045,533
Other Expense, Net      849,454    1,660,037      159,814     342,129
Income Before Taxes  $5,222,539   $1,947,749   $1,626,944    $703,404
Taxes (Benefit)         301,000     (414,000)     179,645    (414,000)
Net Income           $4,921,539   $2,361,749   $1,447,299  $1,117,404
Income Per
 Share: Basic               .43          .24          .12         .11
Number of
 Shares: Basic       11,378,300    9,941,164   11,586,032  10,922,151
Income Per
 Share: Diluted             .39          .21          .11         .09
Number of
 Shares: Diluted     12,779,516   11,372,325   12,974,721  12,371,485

Statements included in this release that are not historical in nature, are intended to be, and are hereby identified as "forward-looking statements". Statements looking forward in time are included in this release pursuant to the "safe harbor" provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such statements involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that may cause the Company's actual results in future periods to be materially different from any future performance suggested herein. www.bioreference.com