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Name Change Is Like Miracle Cure for Docsales.com

Jonathan Gaw covers technology and electronic commerce for The Times. He can be reached at (714) 966-7818 and at jonathan.gaw@latimes.com

The Internet is a financial miracle. Just ask Docsales.com Inc. of Santa Ana.

Three months ago, it was a dog of a company called Golden Pharmaceuticals Inc. that lost money in 13 of its previous 14 quarters and had been virtually ignored by investors. It also is a defendant in 47 lawsuits in three states related to personal injury claims by consumers who used the fen-phen diet drug that it sold.

At the end of February, its total liabilities exceeded its assets by $6.4 million and there was “substantial doubt about the company’s ability to continue as a going concern,” according to regulatory filings.

Today, it has a newly minted name, a strategy peppered with that magic word “Internet,” and a stock that has increased sixfold in value. The stock, which was $1.28 a share in April, closed Friday at $7, down 56 cents in over-the-counter trading. It had reached a high of $8.64 in June.

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Last week, the company said it will expand to “support a sales level of $25-50 million over the next 12-24 months” because of its proposed online store. From 1994 through 1998, the company had a total of $36.5 million in sales and lost $6.93 million.

The company, which last week made a series of announcements listing the technologies it plans to use in building the site, hopes to open for business online in September. No one at the company returned calls.

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