Two years after Amgen merger, Seattle's Immunex workforce has scattered.

Byline: Luke Timmerman

Aug. 30--If someone wrote a play based on the true story of Moya Vazquez, it would go something like this:

Successful career woman at a hot biotech company reaches a turning point around age 50. Megabucks merger throws her out of work. She's not rich but has enough to retire. Soul-searching ensues. She decides to travel the world and volunteer or consult so that her skills don't go to waste. In the end, she finds fulfillment.

OK, it might be hard to cast Meryl Streep for the part.

Two years after Amgen bought Seattle-based Immunex for $10 billion to acquire the hit rheumatoid-arthritis drug Enbrel, the 1,600 people that made Immunex the region's top biotech company have scattered across the region, following multiple personal interests. Some stayed at Amgen. Some retired young. Some moved to other local companies or gravitated to volunteering, as did Vazquez, president of Seattle's Intiman Theatre.

Nobody has tallied the social and economic difference these people will make in their new lives. But ex-Immunexers with money, goals and newfound time on their hands are propping up pockets of Northwest civic life and biotech. It's not much different from the impact made by former Microsofties, but with fewer people and less money.

"There was a lot of brainpower in that company, and now it's focused outward on the community," …