Amgen may want to avoid the “ carpet-bombing approach ” to selling its new osteoporesis drug denosumab , but it is upping its sales firepower by partnering with pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline to market the therapy, the companies announced today. The biotech had said last year it was dropping the approach of fielding as many sales reps as possible to tout a drug, calling that an “outdated” model. In the agreement today, Glaxo will pay Amgen $120 million plus royalties to jointly market denosumab in Europe, Australia, New Zealand and Mexico. Glaxo will take over the commercializing of the therapy in all other countries where Amgen doesn’t currently have a

presence, including emerging market nations like China and India. “We are optimistic about our financial performance in 2009 and are focused on making denosumab a success,” Kevin Sharer, chairman and chief executive officer, said in its second-quarter earnings statement. (Read here for more on Amgen’s Q2 numbers.) Amgen will go it alone in the U.S. and Canada, commercializing denosumab for postmenopausal osteoporosis. And the company is retaining all rights to denosumab for cancer indications. “Cancer we’re not partnering anywhere,” Sharer told the WSJ’s Ron Winslow. “We’re keeping that to ourself.”

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Amgen, GSK to Launch Joint Sales Attack for Bone Drug