Amgen’s Profit Falls 32% in 4th Quarter

Amgen Inc. said its fourth-quarter profit fell 32% to $91.1 million from the $133.8 million the Thousand Oaks biotechnology concern earned a year earlier, when it received a large legal award.

Revenue in the three months ended Dec. 31 climbed 19% to $365.6 million from $308.2 million, spurred by sales of Amgen’s two main products, Epogen and Neupogen. The results, slightly less than some Wall Street estimates, sent Amgen’s stock tumbling $1.75 a share to $47 when the news hit the market last Tuesday.

Amgen has only two drugs on the market: Sales of Epogen, which stimulates the production of red blood cells in kidney-dialysis patients, climbed 18% in the quarter to $160.4 million, and sales of Neupogen, used to produce infection-fighting white blood cells in cancer patients, rose 16% in the latest three months over the same period last year to $186.9 million.

For the year, Amgen posted a record profit of $383.3 million, up 7% from $357.6 million in 1992, ahead of some analysts’ estimates. For 1993, revenue rose 26% to $1.4 billion from $1.1 billion a year earlier.

The 1992 results included a $50.9-million gain from a legal award.

Epogen sales for all of 1993 rose 16% to $586.9 million, while Neupogen’s sales increased 32% to $719.4 million.

Amgen also announced a marketing push into the People’s Republic of China, including recently opened offices in Beijing and Guangzhou. A third office will open in Shanghai by the end of this month.

Epogen was approved for sale in China in 1992, when Amgen also established Amgen Greater China Limited, based in Hong Kong. Neupogen was approved for sale in China last summer.