Bristol-Myers Squibb claims to witness stronger-than-expected fourth quarter earnings, backed by sharply lower taxes and cost cuts, and augurs its 2010 earnings in line with Wall Street expectations, and Eli Lilly, on the other hand, has also seen a profit over the period.

In addition, the drug makers also unveiled they have resolved a dispute over rights to an experimental cancer drug that Lilly acquired with its purchase of ImClone Systems in 2008.

Bristol and Lilly will share in the cost of developing and potentially commercializing the drug, necitumumab, in the U. S., Canada and Japan, while Lilly will keep exclusive rights in all other markets.

Bristol-Myers registered fourth-quarter net income of $8.03 billion, or $4.06 per share, including a $7.2 billion after-tax profit from the segregation of its Mead Johnson nutritional business late last year. In the year-ago period, Bristol-Myers grabbed an earnings of $1.24 billion, or 63 cents per share.

New York-based Bristol is on the track of transforming itself into a pure-play drug company. It has done away with a two-year process of shedding non-pharmaceutical assets, accumulating a $10 billion war chest it can deploy for additional acquisitions and license deals that crop up its drug portfolio.

Bristol hopes its 2010 earnings from its current operations of $1.94 to $2.04 per share, or $2.15 to $2.25 a share excluding certain items, in line with present Wall Street expectations.

Lilly's new anti-clotting drug, Effient, witnessed its fourth-quarter sales of $3.8 million, a sluggish start for a drug that was previously discerned as a potential formidable challenger to Bristol's Plavix.