Oct. 25 (Bloomberg) -- Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. earnings more than doubled after its top seller, the anti-clotting pill Plavix, recaptured the market from a generic rival. Shares rose after Eli Lilly & Co. suspended trials of a potential rival drug.

The company's shares climbed the most in five weeks in New York trading after Bristol said third-quarter net income jumped to $858 million, or 43 cents a share, from $338 million, or 17 cents, a year earlier. Profit excluding some costs beat analysts' estimates by 1 cent.

Sales of Plavix rebounded after New York-based Bristol-Myers won a U.S. patent ruling in June that prevents copies of the drug until 2011. Canada's Apotex Inc. sold generic versions of Plavix for three weeks in August 2006 after a settlement to the patent dispute fell apart. Eli Lilly yesterday suspended two small trials of its experimental anti-clotting medicine prasugrel to adjust dosing. If approved, prasugrel will compete with Plavix.

``Bristol-Myers benefits now from the depletion of generic Plavix, and that is still the biggest contributor to earnings,'' said Les Funtleyder, an analyst with Miller Tabak & Co. in New York, in a telephone interview. Generic stock has ``worked its way out of the channel.''

The patent victory helped buttress earnings as the company began introducing new drugs for cancer, diabetes and blood clots. Plavix sales almost doubled to $1.25 billion. Total third-quarter revenue rose 22 percent to $5.05 billion, the company said in a statement today. Foreign exchange gains boosted sales of most drugs and health-care products.

7 Percent Growth

Plavix is achieving ``7 percent growth of prescriptions year on year after many years in the market place,'' Lamberto Andreotti, the company's president of worldwide pharmaceuticals, said on a conference call today. That ``seems to indicate that we have a good story.''

Excluding certain costs, Bristol-Myers earned 38 cents a share, beating the 37-cent average estimate of 12 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.

Bristol-Myers rose 94 cents, or 3.3 percent, to $29.36 at 4:01 p.m. in New York stock exchange composite trading, its biggest one-day gain since Aug. 8. The stock has gained 12 percent this year.

Excluding some items, the company raised its 2007 profit forecast to $1.42 to $1.47 a share from a July projection of $1.35 to $1.45. Bristol-Myers reiterated its 2008 earnings forecast of $1.60 to $1.70 a share, made in July.

Bristol-Myers lowered its 2007 forecast of net income to $1.28 to $1.33 a share, from $1.35 to $1.45, because of costs from the October acquisition of Adnexus Therapeutics Inc., a closely held developer of a new class of biologic drugs called Adnectins.

Bristol-Myers assumed that Eli Lilly's prasugrel would win U.S. approval in 2008, and take a bigger share of the market in 2009 and 2010, when preparing its forecasts for the coming years, Bristol-Myers Chief Financial Officer Andrew R.J. Bonfield said today on a conference call. The company declined additional comment.

Job Cuts

Costs rose as the company spent more on advertising, marketing, and research and development.

Bristol-Myers is cutting jobs and selling ``non-core'' units to reduce costs and free up capital for acquisitions of ``specialty and biologics'' businesses to boost its experimental product pipeline, Cornelius said.

``We have already begun removing certain jobs, and we will see more positions eliminated in the coming weeks and into 2008,'' Cornelius said. ``We will continue rationalization of facilities.'' He declined to elaborate and said the company will give more details at its Dec. 5 investor conference.

AIDS, Cancer Drugs

Revenue from Abilify for schizophrenia rose 34 percent to $420 million. Sales of the AIDS medicine Reyataz climbed 17 percent to $273 million. Another AIDS therapy, Sustiva, grew 18 percent to $237 million, helped by sales of Gilead Sciences Inc.'s pill Atripla that combines the Bristol-Myers drug with other medicines. The leukemia drug Sprycel, approved last year, generated $46 million, up from $11 million a year ago.

Bristol-Myers on Oct. 16 won U.S. approval for a drug to treat the most advanced form of breast cancer, the first new type of chemotherapy for the disease in 14 years. The injectable drug, ixabepilone, to be marketed as Ixempra, can be used alone or in combination with other therapies for breast cancer patients whose tumors have spread to other organs.

Bristol-Myers abandoned plans to seek U.S. approval of its experimental drug vinflunine for bladder cancer, according to its statement today. The company is ``currently evaluating ongoing research programs,'' and is in development for lung and breast tumors, spokesman Tony Plohoros in a telephone interview.

Erbitux

The cancer treatment Erbitux, which Bristol-Myers markets in the U.S. with New York-based ImClone Systems Inc., recorded a sales increase of 6 percent to $185 million. The drug is approved to treat colon cancer and tumors of the head and neck.

The cancer treatment Erbitux, which Bristol-Myers markets in the U.S. with New York-based ImClone Systems Inc., recorded a sales increase of 6 percent to $185 million. German drugmaker Merck KGaA sells Erbitux in Europe.

Sales of Baraclude, a hepatitis B treatment, rose to $72 million from $22 million a year earlier. Orencia, a rheumatoid arthritis treatment approved last year, increased 76 percent to $60 million. The blood-pressure medicines Avapro and Avalide rose 12 percent to $309 million.

To contact the reporter on this story: Beth Jinks in New York at bjinks1@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: October 25, 2007 16:30 EDT