BioCentury
ARTICLE | Strategy

Celgene: Having it all

April 3, 2000 7:00 AM UTC

Now that biotech companies have raised unprecedented sums of money, investors will be watching how they spend the proceeds. In fact, the amount of money companies are raising may give them degrees of freedom to simultaneously support both earnings and R&D, which would have been unthinkable just a year ago.

One example is Celgene Corp. (CELG, Warren, N.J.). The company plans to use the $250.9 million from its February follow-on not just on R&D, but to double the size of its sales force to meet demand for Thalomid thalidomide from oncologists and prepare to in-license a cancer product to leverage the force. At the same time, the company anticipates turning cash-flow positive in the third quarter...