Analysis: Alimta patent seen as Lilly’s "wild card"

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Eli Lilly & Co may have a $15 billion wild card up its sleeve as it waits for desperately needed new drugs to bear fruit. Should an obscure patent on Lilly lung cancer drug Alimta survive a court challenge this year, the company would be able to wring more than five additional years of peak sales out of the fast-growing product that it would otherwise lose to cheaper generics. Annual sales of Alimta are expected by Wall Street to climb to $3.5 billion by 2016, when its basic patent lapses. …