Amgen Inc. said the financial fallout from safety concerns and reimbursement cuts for its flagship anemia drugs should bottom out during the first half of 2009, bolstering the company’s position as it prepares for the anticipated approval and launch of a new drug for osteoporosis.

In an interview, Kevin Sharer, chairman, president and chief executive of the Thousand Oaks, Calif., biotechnology concern, said the toll from troubles surrounding the anemia drugs, Aranesp and Epogen, amounted to about $1.5 billion in lost annual revenue and forced a restructuring last year that resulted in the loss of about 2,000 jobs, or 10% of the company’s work force.

Mr. Sharer and other Amgen executives plan to tell investors at a meeting in New York Friday that the company has emerged healthy from the most difficult period in its 28-year history. He said Amgen is poised to be “among the top three in revenue growth and earnings growth” in the biopharmaceutical industry over the next five years, a period when many large drug companies will face added pressure because of patent expirations.

Critical to Amgen’s plans is gaining regulatory approval for its experimental bone-strengthening drug, called denosumab, and launching it successfully in an already crowded $7 billion global market for osteoporosis treatments. The company hasn’t said when it will file its application with the Food and Drug Administration, but it could receive approval by the end of 2009.

& #8226;

Read the full

Wall Street Journal

story (subscription required).