Amgen Moves Up to 304th in 1994 Fortune 500 List

Ventura County’s only entry on the Fortune 500 list, Amgen Inc., moved up 22 notches in the 1994 ranking of America’s largest industrial corporations.

The Thousand Oaks biotechnology concern placed 304th on this year’s list, up from 326th in 1993.

In sales, which determine a company’s ranking, Amgen reported $1.306 billion last year, a 24% increase over 1992.

In other categories, the concern ranked 63rd in profits ($383.3 million), 229th in assets ($1.765 billion) and fifth in profits as a percentage of sales (29.3%).

Amgen tops the entire list in return to investors over the past 10 years, with an average annual return of 45%.

Last year, however, the company came in a dismal 410th in return to investors, with shareholders suffering a 29.9% loss in their stock.

That last point prompts Fortune to ask: “Is red-hot Amgen, tops in 10-year total return to investors, cooling off? Sales of Epogen, its market-leading kidney treatment, have begun to slow down.”