Amgen is the place to work, apparently. That’s if you consider the 2008 Executive Compensation Report, just published by BioWorld. It shows the Thousand Oaks, CA-based firm’s CEO, CFO and COO all garnered the highest compensation for their positions in the landscape of publicly traded biotech firms in the U.S.

Amgen CEO Kevin W. Sharer has been the list’s top earner for four years running. For 2006—the year for which the 2008 report captured data—Sharer pulled in a bit more than $6 million, including $4.5 million in bonuses.

Big Bonuses

A distant second: Genentech‘s Arthur D. Levinson, who drew in $3.72 million, including $2.73 million in bonuses. (See list below for the other top earners.)

Both men were part of an industry trend. BioWorld points out that biotech companies are relying more on bonus payments than salaries to pay their top brass. Bonuses constituted 28 percent of CEO salaries in 2006. The average bonus was $155,000, up from $138,000 the year before. Median base salaries were stagnant at $400,000.

Nice CFO Raises

Other data in BioWorld’s 2008 report:

•Among the 275 publicly traded U.S. biotech firms the publication scrutinized, the average stock price was $11.01, up more than 4 percent from 2005. The highest stock price in 2006 was $81.13 (Genentech); lowest was $.06 (Cellegy Pharma).

•Total number of employees at the companies: 122,821. Average number of employees at each: 458.

•Taken as a whole, the companies had a total market capitalization of about $376 billion. A sizable 38 percent of that was attributable to just two companies: Amgen and Genentech.

Who Earns What

•CFOs got better salary bumps than the CEOs did. CFOs made a median salary of $259,000, up 6.1 percent from the previous year. Their bonuses increased 8 percent to a median of $132,000.

•A new category this year: chief operating officers. The 94 COOs who had been in their positions for all of 2006 had a median compensation package of $513,000.

Performance Watch

Glen Harris, managing editor of BioWorld and the report, said there were no major surprises in this year’s numbers. But next year, there may be. That’s because many biotech firms’ boards of directors have been claiming they are going to tie compensation much more closely to performance than they have previously done.

Harris points out that Sharer could fall from his perch if that happens. When the CEO earned his $6 million in 2006, which included a 6 percent increase in his salary, times were good for the company. But last year, Amgen’s stock lost 13 percent of its value. And the company had significant layoffs.

Time To Cut Back?

“It will be interesting to see if boards of directors come through on what they say about performance,” says Harris, “or whether they will say, ‘Hey, well, every company has problems now and then, so let’s stick with this guy without punishing him.’ ”

Whatever happens, Sharer won’t be alone. Of the 25 highest paid biotech CEOs in the report, 11 saw their company’s shares fall in value during 2006.

The report, BioWorld’s fourteenth, costs $599. The data is generated by Salary.com, which culls public reports, pulling out salary information.

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