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COPYRIGHT 2000 Financial Times Ltd.
(From Fair Disclosure Wire)
With that, we will open up the call for questions. I would remind you, again, as a professional courtesy, we ask that each caller try to limit his or her questions to one topic only. Thank you and we'll take the first question. OPERATOR: Thank you. At this time, we're ready to begin the question and answer session. If you'd like to ask a question, please press star 1. When asking your question, please use your handset as opposed to speakerphone. To withdraw your question, please press star 2. The first question is from Bruce Jacobs with Deutsche Bank. BRUCE JACOBS, ANALYST, DEUTSCHE BANK SECURITIES: Thanks so much, guys. Can I ask on the consent to creed, John, your comments about the FDA inspection by the end of the year I want to be clear if you're expecting full resolution by the end of the year? Or just the inspection to commence? And perhaps walk us through the steps between now and then and the internal audits and so fourth?
JOHN THOMAS: It's not been our intention to give play by play, as you know. We purposely tried to put our head down and get through this and do the work that we need to do. So, what I can tell you is that, as I said, the division has met its internal goals, which need to be done, in terms of preparing for a reinspection, by the FDA, which is still on track to happen sometime before the end of the year. Of course, we would hope that that inspection would not take nearly as long as the last inspection did, but, of course, that's up to the FDA. But nonetheless, if that were to occur, we would hope to be finished by the end of the year. Obviously we cannot give 100% guarantee that's going to happen, but we think that by the end of the year or certainly very close to the end of the year is still a very reasonable target based on the work that we need to do, the GAAP analysis, the priority of projects, the auditing by the two outside firms. Everything is on track to meet that timeline. BRUCE JACOBS: Great. Thanks very much. JOHN THOMAS: Okay. OPERATOR: Rick Wise from Bear Stearns. You may ask your question. RICK WISE, ANALYST, BEAR STEARNS: Good morning. A two-part question. First, can you expand on your comments about the hospital admission issues? Can you help us quantify what you saw, it seems to have been unexpected to happen late in the quarter. Is it getting worse as we speak? Getting better? Why should we feel more comfortable in the second half? And just last on Abbokinase, if I remember correctly, your guidance was significantly higher. Why the sharp pullback to the $25 to $35 million range? Can you help us understand why you're less optimistic there? Thank you. JOHN THOMAS: Sure. I'll take those, Rick. Let me take your first question first -- or your second question first, excuse me. With regard to Abbokinase, we never really gave a forecast for this year. We've talked about in the past when we relaunched the product last year, we gave a sense of the total...
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