Lundbeck has posted a reasonable set of financials for the fourth quarter, although profits were down and sales were flat as US revenues from its antidepressant Lexapro took a tumble.

Sales came in at 3.53 billion Danish kroner, about $652.2 million, while operating profit fell 21.3% to 321 million kroner. Sales of Cipralex (escitalopram) climbed 7% to 1.46 billion kroner while the US version of the drug, Lexapro, sold by licensee Forest Laboratories, had sales of 520 million kroner, down 13%. The latter decline was a result of Forest keeping Lexapro inventory levels relatively low.

The Alzheimer's disease drug Ebixa (memantine) climbed 7% to 585 million kroner, while sales of Azilect (rasagiline), for Parkinson’s disease, leapt 21% to 271 million kroner. Xenazine (tetrabenazine) for the treatment of chorea associated with Huntington's disease, had sales of 172 million kroner, up 49%, while the recently-launched Sabril (vigabatrin) for the treatment of refractory complex partial seizures and the treatment of infantile spasms, contributed 56 million kroner.

For 2011, Lundbeck now expects revenues of 15.30-15.80 billion kroner and operating profit of 3.3-3.6 billion kroner. However, for 2012-2014, when escitalopram patents expire and especially in the USA, things will get tougher.

Nevertheless, Lundbeck chief executive Ulf Wiinberg believes that the company has a promising pipeline, and has signed some interesting partnerships which will soften the blow. The first new approval it is hoping for is Onfi (clobazam) for the treatment of Lennox-Gastaut syndrome which was filed with the US Food and Drug Administration at the end of 2010.