Feb. 12 (Bloomberg) -- Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd., the world's biggest generic-drug maker, said fourth-quarter profit jumped 24 percent after it flooded the U.S. market with copies of Wyeth's Protonix heartburn medicine.

Net income rose to $570 million, or 69 cents a share, from $460 million, or 56 cents, a year earlier, the Petah Tikvah, Israel-based company said today. The drugmaker was expected to earn $555.3 million, according to seven analysts surveyed by Bloomberg. Revenue increased 13 percent to $2.6 billion.

Teva is challenging more U.S. brand-name pharmaceutical companies than competing generic-drug makers, and is willing to risk selling products before the patents expire, according to Goldman Sachs analysts. The drugmaker used this ``at risk'' strategy when it released Protonix in December and a version of Novartis AG's Lotrel heart medicine in May.

``Lotrel still has no competition, and Protonix -- in those few days, they sold enough merchandise for two or three or four months,'' said Noa Weisberg, who follows Teva at Israel Brokerage & Investments in Tel Aviv, before the earnings were released.

Protonix was the reason full-year earnings per share of $2.38 beat the company forecast of as much as $2.36, Chief Financial Officer Dan Suesskind said at a press conference in Tel Aviv. Teva grabbed a 68 percent share of the U.S. market for the medication and has the right to 180 days of exclusive sales, Suesskind said.

Sales Exclusivity

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration offers generic-drug makers who are the first to challenge patents sales exclusivity to encourage the introduction of inexpensive medicines.

Teva's shares fell 0.5 percent to 167.10 shekels as of 12:14 p.m. in Tel Aviv. Investors are waiting for Chief Executive Officer Shlomo Yanai to make an earnings-per-share forecast on a conference call later today, said Ori Hershkovitz, who follows Teva at the Sphera Fund in Tel Aviv, in a telephone interview.

Demand for Teva's generic products is growing, Yanai said at the press conference.

``In these times of instability and uncertainty as people are talking about a recession or slowdown around the world, we see more of an opportunity,'' Yanai said.

The value of Protonix sales in 2008 probably will drop once competitors enter the market, he said. In December, Teva stopped selling its Protonix copy pending the outcome of settlement talks with Madison, New Jersey-based Wyeth. The negotiations ended Jan. 31 without an agreement, and Teva hasn't reported any new sales. Wyeth began shipping its own ``authorized generic'' version to compete with Teva's product.

Protonix Sales

Protonix had branded sales of $2.5 billion in the 12 months ended Sept. 30. The copy could add as much as 15 cents to annual earnings per share through exclusive sales, according to Goldman Sachs.

Teva this month won the exclusive right to sell multiple dosages of Merck & Co.'s Fosamax osteoporosis treatment, which had branded sales of $1.9 billion in the year ended Sept. 30.

Teva has 160 new-drug applications at the FDA, representing branded annual sales of about $101 billion, the company said. About 12 of them probably will be approved in 2008, Yanai said.

Teva says it's the first to file 49 of these applications, which target branded sales of $40 billion, the company said.

Sales of Copaxone, Teva's proprietary treatment for multiple sclerosis, rose 15 percent to $436 million. Both the price of the medication and the number of patients using it in the U.S. increased, the company said. Revenue from Teva's other non- generic product, Parkinson's disease medication Azilect, surged 79 percent to $34 million.

Asthma Inhaler

The Israeli drugmaker is profiting from sales of the Pro-Air asthma inhaler it acquired through the purchase of Ivax Corp. in 2006. International environmental law requires countries to phase out traditional chlorofluorocarbon inhalers, which deplete the ozone layer, and switch to hydrofluoroalkane products such as Pro-Air.

Sales of respiratory products rose 18 percent to $189 million in the fourth quarter of 2006, Teva said.

Teva's Israeli shares have risen about 14 percent since Yanai took over on March 1.

Teva's board yesterday decided to pay a dividend of 0.45 shekels (13 U.S. cents) a share. Teva's fourth-quarter profit was helped by a tax rate of 13 percent, compared with a full-year rate of 17 percent.

To contact the reporter on this story: Alex Kuli in Budapest at akuli@bloomberg.net; Tal Barak in Tel Aviv at tbarak@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: February 12, 2008 05:36 EST