Amgen Wins Procedural Ruling on Patent

Amgen Inc. shares rose 5.4% as the Thousand Oaks-based biotechnology company won a procedural ruling in a legal battle to block Transkaryotic Therapies Inc. from selling a version of Amgen’s No. 1 drug, the anemia treatment Epogen. Shares in Amgen, the world’s biggest biotechnology company, rose $2.94 to close at $57.25 on Nasdaq. Cambridge, Mass.-based Transkaryotic shares fell $4.13 to close at $28, also on Nasdaq. A federal judge in Boston decided in favor of Amgen’s claim that Transkaryotic violated one of its patents on Epogen. Though the ruling is procedural and didn’t decide the outcome of the dispute between the two companies, analysts said it made it tougher for Transkaryotic to prevail. The decision narrows the scope of a patent trial, scheduled to begin May 15, to the issue of whether Amgen’s patents are valid, said Morgan Stanley Dean Witter analyst Doug Lind in an e-mail message to investors.