MedAd News releases a list of top 100 biotechnology companies based on revenues. Amgen and Genetech top the list, with Amgen recording a total revenue of $10.55 billion in 2004 that translates to an adjusted net income of $3.1 billion, an increase of 26% compared with 2003. Amgen is now ranked among the top 20 global pharmaceutical companies in the world and will break into the top 10 by 2008, Wood Mackenzie analysts say. On the other hand, Genentech's operating revenue for 2004 increased 40% from 2003 to $4.62 billion.

Life Sciences president of Wood Mackenzie, Jim Hall, says, "Our research shows what the industry has suspected: biotechnology companies have truly come into their own. As biotechs increasingly retain ownership of their developmental compounds and create more targeted blockbuster drugs, they will grow faster than pharmaceutical companies."Bill Mattson, co-CEO of the Mattson Jack Group, does not see any real distinction between big biotech and big pharma: "All bio is seeking to be big pharma if they're fortunate enough at some point.The products of each treat either unserved or underserved diseases or conditions, and whether they're sourced by recombinant proteins, peptides, monoclonals, or synthetic drugs or their administration is parenteral or oral, or how they're manufactured, it's really irrelevant ... To talk about biotech as a group of companies, most of those companies are eventually going to become big pharma just as, in my opinion, Amgen and Genentech and a few others have become."But then, biotech is not solely confined to drug development and improvement of public health. There's Monsanto, for example. And what about those that are, for example, dedicated to environmental biotechnology? Who will venture into these presumably less profitable niches?