For two years running, Carlsbad-based biotech Invitrogen Corp. has been selected for Deloitte & Touche's Orange Coast Technology Fast 50 for revenue growth. In February last year, Invitrogen went public (Nasdaq: IVGN) with an IPO of $15, expecting to raise $45 million for the company to develop, manufacture, and sell products and services to aid in molecular biology research.

Barely two months later, it acquired sole ownership of the patents for the polymerase chain reaction cloning technique that dominates functional genomics research and gene-based drug discovery. At the time, Invitrogen CEO Lyle Turner said he expected the move to "position the company to capture added value on its technology portfolio." A year after its stock-market launch, Invitrogen's market capitalization is now $1.5 billion and its stock closed at $78.75 at press time. Turner appears to be a man of his word.

Invitrogen makes, Turner says, "the picks and shovels" used in genetic research. Those tools now amount to 1,200 products in the company catalog. Turner founded the company in 1987 with a small staff after having served as director of sales and marketing for Stratagene and director of business development for Syntro Corp. He had studied chemistry and molecular biology at UCSD.

In September, the company terminated 45 domestic employees (14 percent of its U.S. workforce) following its summer pooling with privately held, San Diego-based Novex, maker of Novex precast gels to molecular biology customers. Invitrogen now is closing Novex's former Sorrento Valley site and incorporating those manufacturing elements at its Carlsbad headquarters.

In December, the company introduced its Echo Cloning System, a high-speed process to speed drug research and discovery, and in January it acquired Research Genetics Inc. of Huntsville, Ala., which the company says has the world's largest collection — 30,000 — of human genes for cloning. Invitrogen also has European facilities in Heidelberg, Germany and Groningen, Netherlands. (Another facility in Frankfurt has been closed.)

Last month, the 400-employee company announced a private placement of $200 million in convertible subordinated notes as well as profit of $7.4 million on revenue of $68.3 million for 1999 compared to $4.2 million on revenue of $53.7 million in 1998.

— Terence J. Burke