Current Account: Galen is having a tough time getting credit for bucking the trend in the pharmaceuticals sector.
At a time when the industry is in turmoil with worries over patent expiry and, in Ireland's case, the implosion of Elan, the Northern Ireland firm has succeeded where rivals have failed in securing the provisional approval of the US Food and Drugs Administration (FDA) for its new hormone replacement therapy.
Only one step remains between the Craigavon firm and the all-important US market and that is the labelling of its slow-release treatment for menopausal women, which can remain active for up to 90 days.
Coming less than a week after Schering was refused similar approval for its HRT offering and months after a HRT study of a Wyeth product was halted amid fears over side effects, it was a coup for the company.
Final FDA approval will see the new treatment on the US market by next February or March, where it will be distributed through the sales network of Warner Chilcott, acquired by Galen in 2000.
At its peak, in about three or four years, Galen expects the treatment to deliver US sales of $50-$100 million (€51-€103 million). That's hardly small change to a company that last year recorded turnover of £118 million (€187 million).
A bonus for Galen is that it hopes to use the intravaginal ring to deliver other drugs that are in its pipeline.
The shares may have jumped 8 per cent in London on the news but, in the three days since, they have given up all those gains and now stand at the pre-announcement level.
That's not very encouraging, especially in the context of a rising trend since a mid-summer share price collapse, which has seen Galen outperform the FTSE 250 by close to 50 per cent in the past three months.
They have done no better in Dublin.
Alongside Schering, Galen is one of the biggest European players in the HRT treatment market and has been delivering consistently good results.
It would hardly be unreasonable for the company, which has weathered the market downturn, the Elan crisis and the Wyeth HRT scare, to expect a bit more support when it does deliver on its promise.
