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UNITED STATES SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

Washington, D.C. 20549

Form 10-K

(Mark One)

Commission file number 0-25317

Invitrogen Corporation

(Exact name of registrant as specified in its charter)

Registrant’s telephone number, including area code:

760-603-7200

Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(b) of the Act: None

Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(g) of the Act:

Common Stock $.01 Par Value

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant (1) has filed all reports required to be filed by Section 13 or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 during the preceding 12 months (or for such shorter period that the registrant was required to file such reports), and (2) has been subject to such filing requirements for the past 90 days. Yes [X] or No [   ]

Indicate by check mark if disclosure of delinquent filers pursuant to Item 405 of Regulation S-K is not contained herein, and will not be contained, to the best of registrant’s knowledge, in definitive proxy or information statements incorporated by reference in Part III of this Form 10-K or any amendment to this Form 10-K. [   ]

Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is an accelerated filer (as defined in Rule 12b-2 of the Act). Yes [X] or No [   ]

The aggregate market value of the voting and non-voting common equity held by non-affiliates of the registrant as of June 30, 2004 was $3,765,062,100.

The number of outstanding shares of the registrant’s common stock as of February 11, 2005 was 51,585,615.

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INCORPORATION BY REFERENCE

Portions of the registrant’s proxy statement to be filed with the SEC pursuant to Regulation 14A in connection with the registrant’s 2005 Annual Meeting of Stockholders, to be filed subsequent to the date hereof, are incorporated by reference into Part III of this Form 10-K. Such proxy statement will be filed with the SEC not later than 120 days after the conclusion of the registrant’s fiscal year ended December 31, 2004.

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INVITROGEN CORPORATION

Annual Report on Form 10-K

for the Fiscal Year Ended December 31, 2004

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FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS

Any statements in this Annual Report on Form 10-K about our expectations, beliefs, plans, objectives, prospects, financial condition, assumptions or future events or performance are not historical facts and are forward-looking statements. These statements are often, but not always, made through the use of words or phrases such as “believe,” “anticipate,” “should,” “intend,” “plan,” “will,” “expects,” “estimates,” “projects,” “positioned,” “strategy,” “outlook” and similar expressions. Additionally, statements concerning future matters, such as the development of new products, enhancements of technologies, sales levels and operating results and other statements regarding matters that are not historical are forward-looking statements. Accordingly, these statements involve estimates, assumptions and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the results expressed in the statements. Any forward-looking statements are qualified in their entirety by reference to the factors discussed throughout this Form 10-K. The following cautionary statements identify important factors that could cause our actual results to differ materially from those projected in the forward-looking statements made in this Form 10-K. Among the key factors that have a direct impact on our results of operations are:

Because the risk factors referred to above could cause actual results or outcomes to differ materially from those expressed in any forward-looking statements made by us, you should not place undue reliance on any such forward-looking statements. Further, any forward-looking statement speaks only as of the date on which it is made, and we undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statement or statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date on which such statement is made or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events. New factors emerge from time to time, and their emergence is impossible for us to predict. In addition, we cannot assess the impact of each factor on our business or the extent to which any factor, or combination of factors, may cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in any forward-looking statements.

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In this Form 10-K, unless the context requires otherwise, “Invitrogen,” “Company,” “we,” “our,” and “us” means Invitrogen Corporation and its subsidiaries.

PART I

ITEM 1. Business

General Development of Our Business

We began operations as a California partnership in 1987 and incorporated in California in 1989. In 1997 we reincorporated as a Delaware corporation. Our principal offices are in Carlsbad, California. Our website is http://www.invitrogen.com. This Annual Report on Form 10-K, our Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, our Current Reports on Form 8-K and any amendments thereto are made available without charge on our website.

We have made a number of significant acquisitions over the past five years that have expanded our overall size and the breadth of the products we offer, including the 2004 acquisition of BioReliance Corporation, the 2003 acquisitions of Molecular Probes, Inc. and substantially all the assets of PanVera LLC and the acquisitions of Life Technologies, Inc. and Dexter Corporation in 2000. We have also acquired a number of other, smaller companies over the past five years.

Financial Information About Our Segments

We focus our business on two principal business segments, BioDiscovery and BioProduction. Financial information regarding these segments is included in the notes to our consolidated financial statements, which begin on page 48.

Description of Our Business

Company Overview

We are a leading developer, manufacturer and marketer of research tools in reagent, kit and high-throughput applications forms to customers engaged in life sciences research, drug discovery, diagnostics and the commercial manufacture of biological products. Additionally, we are a leading supplier of sera, cell and tissue culture media and reagents used in life sciences research, as well as in processes to grow cells in the laboratory and produce pharmaceuticals and other high valued proteins.

Our research tools and reagents simplify and improve gene cloning, gene expression and gene analysis techniques. These techniques are used to study how a gene or cell is regulated by its genetic mechanisms, known as functional genomics, and to search for drugs that can treat diseases. In addition, we have a growing portfolio of products for proteomics applications, providing tools to help researchers understand the function of proteins, their roles in biological pathways, and importance in diseases such as cancer. Our leading products include gel-based separations technologies, antibodies, and protoarrays. Our goal is to produce tools, which allow researchers to perform this complex biological research more accurately, efficiently and with greater reproducibility compared to conventional research methods. Our scientific know-how is making biodiscovery research techniques more effective and efficient to pharmaceutical, biotechnology, agricultural, government and academic researchers with backgrounds in a wide range of scientific disciplines.

We offer many different products and services, and are continually developing and/or acquiring others. Some of our specific product categories include the following:

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Target Markets

We divide our target customer base into principally two categories:

While we do not believe that any single customer or small group of customers is material to our business as a whole or to either of our product segments (described below), many of our customers in our target markets receive funding for their research, either directly or indirectly from grants from the federal government of the United States and from other government agencies in countries around the world.

Life Sciences Research

The life sciences research market consists of laboratories generally associated with universities, medical research centers, government institutions such as the National Institutes of Health, and other research institutions as well as biotechnology, pharmaceutical, energy, agricultural and chemical companies. Our products and services provide the special biochemical research tools capable of performing precise functions in a given experimental procedure that life sciences researchers require. We serve two principal disciplines of this market: cellular biochemistry and genomics.

The cellular biochemistry research market involves the study of the genetic functioning and biochemical composition of cells as well as their proliferation, differentiation, growth and death. The understanding gained from such study has broad application in the field of developmental biology and is important in the search for drugs or other techniques to combat a wide variety of diseases, such as cancer and viral and bacterial disease, as well as to assist in vaccine design, bioproduction and agriculture. To grow the cells required for research, researchers use our cell or tissue culture media to simulate under laboratory conditions (in-vitro) the environment in which cells live naturally (in-vivo) and to provide the required nutrients.

Genomics involves the study of the genetic information systems of living organisms. The genetic material of living organisms consists of molecules of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid). DNA contains the information required for the organism’s production of proteins. Proteins have many different functional properties and are a broad class of amino acid based molecules that include, among other things, antibodies, certain hormones and enzymes. Many researchers study the various steps of the organism’s production of proteins and their impact on cellular function. Other researchers are interested in manipulating DNA to modify the production of proteins. Through techniques that are commonly termed “genetic engineering” or “gene-splicing,” a researcher can modify an organism’s naturally occurring DNA to produce a desired protein not usually formed by the organism, or to produce a naturally formed protein at an increased rate.

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Our products serve customers who are in drug discovery or the development of diagnostics for disease identification or for improving the efficacy of drugs to targeted patient groups. Traditional drug discovery using high throughput biochemical and cell-based assays allow pharmaceutical researchers to test targeted medicinal compounds against specific disease pathways to identify the potential compound to interrupt the disease process. By tagging compounds with various reporter technologies, scientists can measure the effectiveness of the compound at the cellular level, which assist the researcher in determination of drug candidates to advance to the next level. High valued protein targets such as kinases are attractive druggable candidates, and Invitrogen is one of the world’s largest suppliers of these products.

In addition, Invitrogen’s research tools are important in the development of diagnostics for disease determination as well as identification of patients for more targeted therapy. The proposed acquisition of Dynal Biotech Holding ASA (Dynal) provides a complete platform for diagnostic solutions that diagnostic customers can source from Invitrogen.

Commercial Production

We also serve industries that apply genetic engineering to the commercial production of useful but otherwise rare or difficult to obtain substances, such as proteins, interferons, interleukins, t-PA and monoclonal antibodies. The manufacturers of these materials require larger quantities of the same sera and other cell growth media that we provide in smaller quantities to researchers. Other industries involved in the commercial production of genetically engineered products include the pharmaceutical, food processing and agricultural industries.

Our Products

We divide our products into two broad segments that are closely aligned with our target markets, as follows:

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We plan to continue to introduce new research products, as we believe continued new product development and rapid product introduction is a critical competitive factor in the biodiscovery and bioproduction markets. We may continue to increase expenditures in sales and marketing, manufacturing and research and development to support increased levels of sales and to augment our long-term competitive position.

We principally purchase raw materials and components from third parties and use those ingredients to manufacture products for inventory. We typically ship those products shortly after the receipt of orders. Our oligonucleotide, genomic services, general services, RNAi (gene regulation), BioReliance services (biologics, lot release, toxicology and product safety) and BioProduction businesses, however, are all made to order, and certain of our products are made for us by third parties. Because we ship shortly after receipt of orders, make products to order or purchase from third parties, we do not have a significant backlog in either of our segments and do not anticipate we will develop a material backlog in the future. Most of our products and services are manufactured or provided from our facilities in Carlsbad, California; Eugene, Oregon; Frederick and Rockville, Maryland; Grand Island, New York; Madison, Wisconsin; Auckland, New Zealand; and Paisley, Scotland. We also have manufacturing facilities in Japan, Brazil, and Israel.

Research and Development

We believe that a strong research and product development effort is important to our future growth. We spent $73.1 million,$54.6 million, and $33.7 million on research and development activities in 2004, 2003 and, 2002, respectively. These research and development expenses were primarily directed toward developing innovative new products in areas where we have expertise and have identified substantial market needs, creating solutions for customers in the life sciences research and industrial bioprocessing areas and improving production processes.

We conduct most of our research and development activities at our own facilities in the United States, using our own employees. At December 31, 2004, we had approximately 450 employees principally engaged in research and development. Our scientific staff is augmented by advisory and collaborative relationships with a number of scientists.

Our research and development activity is aimed at maintaining a leadership position in providing research tools to the life sciences research market and enhancing our market position as a supplier of products used to manufacture genetically engineered pharmaceuticals and other materials.

Sales and Marketing

We sell most of our products through our own sales force, and the remaining products are sold through agents or distributors. We currently market our products directly in over 24 countries throughout the world and sell through distributors or agents in approximately 45 additional countries. These independent distributors may also market research products for other companies, including some products that are competitive with our offerings. As of December 31, 2004, we employed approximately 1,025 people in our sales and marketing group.

Our sales strategy has been to employ scientists to work as our technical sales representatives. Most of our technical sales representatives have an extensive background in biology and molecular biology. A thorough knowledge of biological techniques and an understanding of the research process allows our sales representatives to become advisors, acting in a consultative role with our customers. Our use of technical sales representatives also enables us to identify market needs and new technologies that we can license and develop into new products.

Our marketing departments in our U.S. and European headquarters, and in local offices throughout the Asia-Pacific region, combine various types of media and methods to inform customers of new product developments and enhancements to existing products. We advertise in prominent scientific journals, publish a yearly catalog, a bi-monthly newsletter and conduct direct mail campaigns to researchers. We also reach a broad range of

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scientists by hosting an annual symposium in the U.S., presenting at scientific seminars and providing exhibits at scientific meetings. Our website also allows researchers to view an on-line catalog, download technical manuals and vector sequences, read our newsletter and participate in interactive forums and discussion groups.

Technology Licensing

Many of our existing products are manufactured or sold under the terms of license agreements that require us to pay royalties to the licensor based upon a percentage of the sales of products containing the licensed materials or technology. These licenses also typically impose obligations on us to market the licensed technology. Although we emphasize our own research and development, we believe our ability to in-license new technology from third parties is and will continue to be critical to our ability to offer competitive new products. Our ability to obtain these in-licenses depends in part on our ability to convince inventors that we will be successful in bringing new products incorporating their technology to market. Our significant licenses or exclusivity rights expire at various times during the next 15 years. There are certain risks associated with relying on third-party licensed technologies, including our ability to identify attractive technologies, license them on acceptable terms, meet our obligations under the licenses, renew those licenses should they expire before we retire the related product and the risk that the third party may lose patent protection. These risks are more fully described under the heading “Risk Factors that May Affect Future Results” below.

Patents and Proprietary Technologies

We consider the protection of our proprietary technologies and products in both of our product segments to be important to the success of our business and rely on a combination of patents, licenses, copyrights and trademarks to protect these technologies and products. We currently rely on over 700 issued patents, which we own or have exclusive control of. Of this amount in the United States we control over 350 patents, and over 400 in other major industrialized countries, and have numerous pending patent applications both domestic and internationally. Our success depends, to a significant degree, upon our ability to develop proprietary products and technologies. It is important to our success that we protect the intellectual property associated with these products and technologies. We intend to continue to file patent applications as we develop new products and technologies. Patents provide some degree of, but not complete, protection for our intellectual property.

We also rely in part on trade secret, copyright and trademark protection of our intellectual property. We protect our trade secrets by entering into confidentiality agreements with third parties, employees and consultants. Employees and consultants also sign agreements to assign to us their interests in patents and copyrights arising from their work for us. Employees also agree not to engage in unfair competition with us after their employment by using our confidential information. We have additional secrecy measures as well. There are risks related to our reliance on patents, trade secret, copyright and trademark protection laws, which are described in more detail below under the heading “Risk Factors that May Affect Future Results.”

Competition

The markets for the products of both of our segments are very competitive and price sensitive. There are numerous life science research product suppliers that compete with us, which have significant financial, operational, sales and marketing resources, and experience in research and development, although many of these competitors only compete with us in a limited portion of our product line. These and other companies may have developed or could in the future develop new technologies that compete with our products or even render our products obsolete. Additionally, instead of using kits, there are numerous scientists making materials themselves. We believe that a company’s competitive position in our markets is determined by product function, product quality, speed of delivery, technical support, price, breadth of product line, and timely product development. We believe our customers are diverse and place varying degrees of importance on the competitive attributes listed above. While it is difficult to rank these attributes for all our customers in the aggregate, we believe we are well positioned to compete in each category.

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Suppliers

We buy materials for our products from many suppliers. While there are some raw materials that we obtain from a single supplier, we are not dependent on any one supplier or group of suppliers for our business as a whole, or for either of our BioDiscovery and BioProduction segments. Raw materials, other than raw fetal bovine serum (FBS), are generally available from a number of suppliers.

We acquired Serum Technologies Pty Limited in December 2002 and Serum Technologies in June 2003 in part to secure a supply of raw Australian and U.S.-sourced FBS. However, they do not provide us with a large enough source of FBS to satisfy all of our FBS needs. As a result, we still acquire raw FBS from various third party suppliers. None of these suppliers, however, individually provides a majority of the total FBS we purchase from third parties. In addition, the supply of raw FBS is sometimes limited because serum collection tends to be seasonal. This causes the price of raw FBS to fluctuate. Although there is a well-established market for finished FBS, which is one of our major BioProduction products, the profit margins we achieve on finished FBS have varied significantly in the past because of the fluctuations in the price of raw FBS.

Through a combination of the FBS we receive from Serum Technologies and our third party suppliers, we believe we maintain a quantity of FBS inventory adequate to address reasonable customer service levels while guarding against normal volatility in the supply of FBS available to us from third party suppliers. FBS inventory quantities can fluctuate significantly as we balance varying customer demand for FBS against fluctuating supplies of FBS available to us; however, we believe that we will be able to continue to acquire FBS in quantities sufficient to meet our customers’ current requirements.

Government Regulation

Certain of our products and services, as well as the manufacturing process of the products, are subject to regulation under various portions of the U.S. Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act. In addition, a number of our manufacturing facilities are subject to periodic inspection by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), other product-oriented federal agencies and various state and local authorities in the U.S. We believe such facilities are in compliance in all material aspects with the requirements of the FDA’s Quality System Regulation (formerly known as Good Manufacturing Practices), other federal, state and local regulations and other quality standards such as ISO 9001. Portions of our business subject to the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act include certain BioProduction segment products (with respect to their testing, safety, efficacy, marketing, labeling and other matters) and the services performed by our BioReliance subsidiary (production of pharmaceutical and biological products for human clinical use or for sale in the U.S.).

Materials used in development and testing activities at several of our facilities are also subject to the Controlled Substances Act, administered by the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA). Required procedures for control, use and inventory of these materials are in place at these facilities.

Our BioReliance subsidiary maintains animal facilities for use primarily in assessing product safety during the preclinical stage of pharmaceutical product development. BioReliance is registered with the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) as a research facility, meeting the requirements of the USDA Animal Welfare Act as determined by periodic USDA inspections. In addition, the business is accredited by the Association for the Assessment and Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care International (AAALAC), which is considered to be the industry standard. BioReliance also holds Public Health Service Animal Welfare Assurance granted by the NIH Office for Laboratory Welfare (OLAW).

We also comply with the OSHA Blood Borne Pathogens Standard and voluntarily employ Centers for Disease Control/National Institutes of Health, Guidelines for Research Involving Recombinant DNA Molecules, Biosafety in Microbiological and Biomedical Laboratories and the hazard classification system recommendations for handling bacterial and viral agents, with capabilities through biosafety level three.

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In addition to the foregoing, we are subject to other federal, state and local laws and ordinances applicable to our business, including environmental protection and radiation protection laws and regulations, the Occupational Safety and Health Act; the Toxic Substances Control Act; national restrictions on technology transfer, import, export and customs regulations; statutes and regulations relating to government contracting; and similar laws and regulations in foreign countries. In particular, we are subject to various foreign regulations sometimes restricting the importation or the exportation of animal-derived products such as FBS.

Employees

As of January 31, 2005, we had approximately 3,800 employees, 1,750 of whom were employed outside the United States. Our success will depend in large part upon our ability to attract and retain employees. We face competition in this regard from other companies, research and academic institutions, government entities and other organizations.

Executive Officers of the Registrant

The Board of Directors appoints executive officers of Invitrogen, and the Chief Executive Officer has authority to hire and terminate such officers. Each executive officer holds office until the earlier of his or her death, resignation, removal from office or the appointment of his or her successor. No family relationships exist among any of Invitrogen’s executive officers, directors or persons nominated to serve in those positions. We have listed the ages, positions held and the periods during which our current executive officers have served in those positions below:

Gregory T. Lucier (age 40) has served as President, Chief Executive Officer of Invitrogen since May 2003. Mr. Lucier has served as a member of the board of directors since May 2003 and was appointed Chairman of the Board of Directors in April 2004. From June 2000 to May 2003, Mr. Lucier served as President and Chief Executive Officer of GE Medical Systems Information Technologies. Mr. Lucier has also served in a variety of other leadership positions during his career with General Electric (GE), including Vice President, Global Services of a division of GE Medical Systems during which he served from August 1999 to June 2000. Mr. Lucier received his B.S. in Engineering from Pennsylvania State University and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.

Claude D. Benchimol, Ph.D. (age 55) joined us as our Senior Vice President of Research and Development in September 2003. Prior to joining Invitrogen, Dr. Benchimol held a variety of technology leadership roles during his more than 15 years at General Electric (GE). Most recently, he was Vice President and General Manager of global technology for GE Medical Systems Information Technologies, holding that position from January 2002 to August 2003. Dr. Benchimol received an equivalent of an M.S. in Engineering from Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Télécommunications in France, as well as an M.S. and Ph.D. in Systems Science from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Benjamin E. Bulkley (age 41) joined as our Senior Vice President, Commercial Operations in October 2003. Mr. Bulkley, who joined Invitrogen in October 2003, worked with General Electric (GE) for more than 16 years in various leadership roles throughout the organization. Most recently, Mr. Bulkley served as Vice President of Global Services of GE Medical Systems Information Technologies, where he was responsible for a 1,500-person global services business, including marketing and sales, customer training, call centers, and distribution. Mr. Bulkley received a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Connecticut, and an M.S. in Systems Engineering from Gannon University in Pennsylvania.

Nicolas M. Barthelemy (age 39) joined us as Senior Vice President of Global Operations in 2004. Prior to joining Invitrogen, Mr. Barthelemy held a variety of executive roles at Biogen Idec Inc., most as Vice President of Manufacturing. Mr. Barthelemy received his M.S. degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, and, the equivalent of an M.S. in Chemistry from Ecole Supérieure de Physiques et Chimie Industrielles, and the equivalent of a B.S. in Mathematics, Physics, and Chemistry from Ecole Sainte Geneviève.

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John A. Cottingham (age 50) joined us as our Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary in November 2000 when we acquired Life Technologies, and was made a Senior Vice President in 2004. He served as Vice President and General Counsel of Life Technologies from May 2000 until the merger. From January 1996 until May 2000, Mr. Cottingham was the General Counsel and Assistant Secretary of Life Technologies. Prior to joining Life Technologies, he had been an international corporate attorney with the Washington, D.C. office of Fulbright and Jaworski L.L.P. from May 1988 through December 1995. Mr. Cottingham received his B.A. in Political Science from Furman University, his JD from the University of South Carolina and his L.L.M. in Securities Regulation from Georgetown University.

Daryl J. Faulkner (age 56) was appointed Senior Vice President, Business Segment Management of Invitrogen in November 2003. Prior to that he served in several positions at Invitrogen, including Senior Vice President, International Operations and General Manager and Vice President, Europe, since the acquisition of Life Technologies in November 2000. Prior to the acquisition he served as General Manager and Vice President, Europe, of Life Technologies from August 1999 to September 2000. Mr. Faulkner received a B.S. in Industrial Relations from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill and an M.A. in Business Management from Webster University.

Karen S. Gibson (age 42) was appointed Chief Information Officer in January 2004. Prior to that she served as Vice President of Global eBusiness and Chief Information Officer (CIO) for GE Medical Systems Information Technologies. Prior to that role, Karen worked in a similar capacity as the Information Management Leader and CIO for GE’s Industrial Systems division. Ms. Gibson has also worked as Director of IT for Quantum Health Resources and Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Inc. (a Johnson & Johnson Co.). Ms. Gibson holds a B.S. in Computer Technology from Purdue University, and an M.B.A. from Ohio University.

David F. Hoffmeister (age 50) has served as Chief Financial Officer, Senior Vice President, Finance, since October 2004. Mr. Hoffmeister has held various positions for the past 20 years with McKinsey & Company, most recently since 1997 as a Director serving clients in the healthcare, private equity and specialty chemicals industries. Prior to joining McKinsey, Mr. Hoffmeister held financial positions at GTE and W.R. Grace. Mr. Hoffmeister received a BS in Business, from the University of Minnesota, and an M.B.A. from the University of Chicago.

John M. Radak (age 44) joined Invitrogen in January 2003 as Vice President, Finance and Chief Accounting Officer. From August 2001 to January 2003, Mr. Radak was an independent consultant. From December 1994 to August 2001, Mr. Radak served as Vice President Finance and Corporate Controller for Sunrise Medical Inc. Mr. Radak received a B.A. in Business Administration from California State University, Fullerton and is a Certified Public Accountant.

Joseph L. Rodriguez (age 38) has served as our Senior Vice President of Human Resources since October 2003. Prior to joining Invitrogen, Mr. Rodriguez served in a variety of human resource roles. From 2002 to October 2003, he was Vice President of Human Resources for Home Depot, Inc., and from 1999 to 2002, he was Vice President of Human Resources for Honeywell International Inc. Mr. Rodriguez received a B.S. in Psychology from William Paterson University, an M.A. in Organizational Psychology from Columbia University and an M.B.A. from Case Western Reserve University.

John D. Thompson (age 55) has worked with Invitrogen since the merger of Dexter Corporation into Invitrogen in September 2000 and has served as Senior Vice President of Corporate Development since October 2003. From November 2000 to October 2003, he served as Vice President, Corporate Development of Invitrogen. From January 1995 to September 2000, Mr. Thompson was the Senior Vice President, Strategic and Business Development for Dexter Corporation. Mr. Thompson received his BBA in Accounting from Cleveland State University.

Risk Factors that May Affect Future Results

You should carefully consider the following risks, together with other matters described in this Form 10-K or incorporated herein by reference in evaluating our business and prospects. If any of the following risks occurs,

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our business, financial condition or operating results could be harmed. In such case, the trading price of our securities could decline, in some cases significantly. The risks described below are not the only ones we face. Additional risks not presently known to us or that we currently deem immaterial may also impair our business operations. Certain statements in this Form 10-K (including certain of the following factors) constitute forward-looking statements. Please refer to the section entitled “Forward-Looking Statements” on page 1 of this Form 10-K for important limitations on these forward-looking statements.

Risks Related to the Growth of Our Business

We must continually offer new products and technologies.

Our success depends in large part on continuous, timely development and introduction of new products that address evolving market requirements and are attractive to customers. For example, prepackaged kits to perform research in particular cell lines and already-isolated genetic material only recently have come into widespread use among researchers. We also believe that because of the initial time investment required by our customers to purchase a new product, once a customer purchases a product from a competitor, it is very difficult to regain that customer.

These facts have led us to focus significant efforts and resources on the development and identification of new technologies and products. As a result, we have a very broad product line and are continually looking to develop, license or acquire new technologies and products to further broaden it. If we fail to develop, license or otherwise acquire new technologies, our customers will likely purchase products from our competitors, significantly harming our business. Once we have developed or obtained the technology, to the extent that we fail to timely introduce new and innovative products that are accepted by our markets, we could fail to obtain an adequate return on our research and development, licensing and acquisition investments and could lose market share to our competitors, which would be difficult or impossible to regain and could seriously damage our business. Some of the factors affecting market acceptance of our products include:

Failure to integrate acquired businesses into our operations successfully could adversely affect our business.

As part of our strategy to develop and identify new products and technologies, we have made several acquisitions, and are likely to make more. Our integration of the operations of acquired businesses requires significant efforts, including the coordination of information technologies, research and development, sales and marketing, operations, manufacturing and finance. These efforts result in additional expenses and involve significant amounts of management’s time that cannot then be dedicated to other projects. Our failure to manage successfully and coordinate the growth of the combined company could also have an adverse impact on our business. In addition, there is no guarantee that some of the businesses we acquire will become profitable or remain so. If our acquisitions do not reach our initial expectations, we may record unexpected impairment charges. Factors that will affect the success of our acquisitions include:

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Risks Related to Our Sales

We face significant competition.

The markets for our products are very competitive and price sensitive. Our competitors, which could include certain of our customers such as large pharmaceutical companies, have significant financial, operational, sales and marketing resources and experience in research and development. Our competitors could develop new technologies that compete with our products or even render our products obsolete. If a competitor develops superior technology or cost-effective alternatives to our kits and other products, our business could be seriously harmed.

The markets for certain of our products, such as electrophoresis products, custom primers, amplification products, and fetal bovine serum, are also subject to specific competitive risks. These markets are highly price competitive. Our competitors have competed in the past by lowering prices on certain products. If they did so again we may be forced to respond by lowering our prices. This would reduce revenues and profits. Conversely, failure to anticipate and respond to price competition may hurt our market share.

We believe that customers in our markets display a significant amount of loyalty to their initial supplier of a particular product. Therefore, it may be difficult to generate sales to potential customers who have purchased products from competitors. Additionally, instead of using kits, there are numerous scientists making materials themselves. To the extent we are unable to be the first to develop and supply new products, customers may buy from our competitors or make materials themselves, causing our competitive position to suffer.

There has been a trend toward industry consolidation in our markets for the past several quarters. We expect this trend toward industry consolidation to continue as companies attempt to strengthen or hold their market positions in an evolving industry and as companies are acquired or are unable to continue operations. We believe that industry consolidation may result in stronger competitors that are better able to compete as sole-source vendors for customers. This could lead to more variability in operating results and could have a material adverse effect on our business.

Reduction in research and development budgets and government funding may affect sales.

Our customers include researchers at pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, academic institutions, government laboratories and private foundations. Fluctuations in the research and development budgets of these researchers and their organizations could have a significant effect on the demand for our products. Research and development budgets fluctuate due to changes in available resources, mergers of pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, spending priorities, general economic conditions and institutional and governmental budgetary policies. Our business could be seriously damaged by any significant decrease in life sciences research and development expenditures by pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, academic institutions, government laboratories or private foundations. In particular a significant portion of our sales have been to researchers whose funding is dependent upon grants from government agencies such as the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH). Although the level of research funding increased significantly during the years of 1999 through 2003, increases for fiscal 2004 and 2005 were significantly lower. Government funding of research and development is subject to the political process, which is inherently fluid and unpredictable. Other programs, such as homeland security or defense, or general efforts to reduce the federal budget deficit could be viewed by the U.S. government as a higher priority. Past proposals to reduce budget deficits have included reduced NIH and other research and development allocations. Any shift away from the funding of life sciences research and development or delays surrounding the approval of government budget proposals may cause our customers to delay or forego purchases of our products, which could seriously damage our business.

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In recent years, the pharmaceutical industry has undergone consolidation. Additional mergers or corporate consolidations in the pharmaceutical industry could cause us to lose customers, which could have a harmful effect on our business.

Our customers generally receive funds from approved grants at particular times of the year, for example; as determined by the U.S. federal government. In the past, such grants have been frozen for extended periods or have otherwise become unavailable to various institutions without advance notice. The timing of the receipt of grant funds affects the timing of purchase decisions by our customers and, as a result, can cause fluctuations in our sales and operating results.

Changing purchasing arrangements with our customers could reduce our profit margins.

Certain of our customers have developed purchasing initiatives to reduce the number of vendors from which they purchase in order to lower their supply costs. In some cases these accounts have established agreements with large distributors, which include discounts and the distributors’ direct involvement with the purchasing process. These activities may force us to supply the large distributors with our products at a discount to reach those customers. For similar reasons many larger customers, including the U.S. government, have requested and may in the future request, special pricing arrangements, including blanket purchase agreements. These agreements may limit our pricing flexibility, which could have an adverse impact on our business, financial condition and results of operations. Our pricing flexibility could particularly be affected with respect to our price-sensitive products, such as electrophoresis products, custom oligonucleotides (primers), amplification products, and fetal bovine serum. For a limited number of customers we have made sales, at the customer’s request, through third-party Internet vendors, to whom we are required to pay commissions. If our Internet sales grew, it could have a negative impact on our gross margins.

Sales of biological and chemical defense materials subject us to certain risks.

We have launched a biodefense initiative, which depends upon the acceptance of our products by the U.S. government and its defense contractors.

We have developed products for use in detecting exposure to biological pathogens, and have begun marketing those products to the U.S. government and several defense contractors. If our products do not perform well, or the U.S. government changes its priorities with respect to defense against biological and chemical weapons, our sales growth could be affected. In addition, some third parties could object to our development of biological defense products, which could have a negative impact on our company.

Risks Related to the Development and Manufacturing of Our Products

Failure to license new technologies could impair our new product development.

We believe our ability to in-license new technologies from third parties is and will continue to be critical to our ability to offer new products and therefore our business. A significant portion of our current revenues is from products manufactured or sold under licenses from third parties. Our ability to gain access to technologies that we need for new products and services depends in part on our ability to convince inventors and their agents or assignees that we can successfully commercialize their inventions. We cannot assure you that we will be able to continue to identify new technologies of interest to our customers, which are developed by others. Even if we are able to identify new technologies of interest, we may not be able to negotiate a license on acceptable terms, or at all.

Loss of licensed rights could hurt our business.

A small number of our licenses do not run for the length of the underlying patent. We may not be able to renew our existing licenses on favorable terms, or at all. If we lose the rights to a patented technology, we may

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need to stop selling these products and possibly other products, redesign our products or lose a competitive advantage. While most of our licenses are exclusive to us in certain markets, potential competitors could also in-license technologies that we fail to exclusively license and potentially erode our market share for these and other products. Our licenses also typically subject us to various economic and commercialization obligations. If we fail to comply with these obligations we could lose important rights under a license, such as exclusivity. In some cases, we could lose all rights under a license. Loss of such rights could, in some cases, harm our business.

In addition, certain rights granted under the license could be lost for reasons out of our control. For example, the licensor could lose patent protection for a number of reasons, including invalidity of the licensed patent, or a third party could obtain a patent that curtails our freedom to operate under one or more licenses. We do not receive indemnification from a licensor against third-party claims of intellectual property infringement.

Fluctuation in the price and supply of raw FBS could affect our business.

The supply of raw fetal bovine serum (FBS) is sometimes limited because serum collection tends to be cyclical. In addition, any additional discovery of bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE (popularly referred to as mad cow disease) in the U.S. may cause a decline in the demand for FBS supplied from the United States. These factors can cause the price of raw FBS to fluctuate. The profit margins we achieve on finished FBS, one of our major products, have been unstable in the past because of the fluctuations in the price of raw FBS, and any increase in the price could adversely affect those profit margins. In addition, if we are unable to obtain an adequate supply of FBS, or if we are unable to meet demand for FBS from supplies outside the U.S., we may lose market share.

Violation of government regulations or voluntary quality programs could result in loss of revenues and additional expense.

Certain of our products and test services are regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as medical devices, pharmaceuticals, or biologics. As a result we must register with the FDA as both a medical device manufacturer and a manufacturer of drug products and comply with all required regulations. Failure to comply with these regulations can lead to sanctions by the FDA such as written observations made following inspections, warning letters, product recalls, fines, product seizures and consent decrees. Test data for use in client submissions with the FDA could be disqualified. If the FDA were to take such actions, the FDA’s sanctions would be available to the public. Such publicity could adversely affect our ability to sell these regulated products.

Additionally, some of our customers use our products and services in the manufacturing process for their drug and medical device products, and such end products are regulated by the FDA under Quality System Regulations (QSR). Although the customer is ultimately responsible for QSR compliance for their products, it is also the customer’s expectation that the materials sold to them will meet QSR requirements. We could lose sales and customers, and incur product liability claims, if our products do not meet QSR requirements.

ISO is an internationally recognized voluntary quality standard that requires compliance with a variety of quality requirements somewhat similar to the QSR requirements. The operations of our BioProduction segments and Eugene, Oregon facilities are intended to comply with ISO 9001. Failure to comply with this voluntary standard can lead to observations of non-compliance or even suspension of ISO certification by the certifying unit. If we lose ISO certification, this loss could cause some customers to purchase products from other suppliers.

If we violate a government mandated or voluntary quality program, we may incur additional expense to comply with the government mandated or voluntary standards. That expense may be material, and we may not have anticipated that expense in our financial forecasts. Our financial results could suffer as a result of these increased expenses.

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Risks Related to Our Intellectual Property

Inability to protect our technologies could affect our ability to compete.

Our success depends to a significant degree upon our ability to develop proprietary products and technologies. When we develop such technologies, we routinely seek patent protection in the United States and abroad to the extent permitted by law. However, we cannot assure you that patents will be granted on any of our patent applications or that the scope of any of our issued patents will be sufficiently broad to offer meaningful protection. We only have patents issued in selected countries. Therefore, third parties can make, use, and sell products covered by our patents in any country in which we do not have patent protection. In addition, our issued patents or patents we license could be successfully challenged, invalidated or circumvented so that our patent rights would not create an effective competitive barrier. We provide our customers the right to use our products under label licenses that are for research purposes only. The validity of the restrictions contained in these licenses could be contested, and we cannot assure you that we would either be aware of an unauthorized use or be able to enforce the restrictions in a cost-effective manner.

If a third party claimed an intellectual property right to technology we use, we might need to discontinue an important product or product line, alter our products and processes, defend our right to use such technology in court or pay license fees. Although we might under these circumstances attempt to obtain a license to such intellectual property, we may not be able to do so on favorable terms, or at all. Additionally, if our products are found to infringe a third party’s intellectual property, we may be required to pay damages for past infringement, and lose the ability to sell certain products or receive licensing revenues.

Disclosure of trade secrets could aid our competitors.

We attempt to protect our trade secrets by entering into confidentiality agreements with third parties, our employees and consultants. However, these agreements can be breached and, if they are, there may not be an adequate remedy available to us. If our trade secrets become known we may lose our competitive position.

Intellectual property litigation and other litigation could harm our business.

Litigation regarding patents and other intellectual property rights is extensive in the biotechnology industry. We are aware that patents have been applied for and, in some cases, issued to others claiming technologies that are closely related to ours. We are currently a defendant in several court actions involving our intellectual property. As a result, and in part due to the ambiguities and evolving nature of intellectual property law, we periodically receive notices of potential infringement of patents held by others. We may not be able to resolve these types of claims successfully in the future.

We are currently enforcing our intellectual property rights through patent litigation in several court actions. We have incurred substantial costs, and are currently incurring substantial costs, in enforcing our intellectual property rights, primarily relating to H minus reverse transcriptase, which is the basis for our Superscript^™ and related product lines, and we expect to incur such costs in the future for Superscript and other technologies. In the event of additional intellectual property disputes, we may be involved in further litigation. In addition to court actions, patent litigation could involve proceedings before the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office or the International Trade Commission. Intellectual property litigation can be extremely expensive, and such expense, as well as the consequences should we not prevail, could seriously harm our business. If we do not prevail in our pending patent litigation relating to H minus reverse transcriptase, we may be unable to prevent third parties from using this technology in the commercial marketplace. This could have a seriously harmful effect on our business.

Risks Related to Our Operations

Litigation may harm our business or otherwise distract our management.

Substantial, complex or extended litigation could cause us to incur large expenditures and distract our management. For example, lawsuits by employees, stockholders, collaborators, distributors, customers, or end-users

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of our products or services could be very costly and substantially disrupt our business. Disputes from time to time with such companies or individuals are not uncommon, and we cannot assure you that we will always be able to resolve such disputes out of court or on terms favorable to us. Unexpected results could cause our financial exposure in these matters to exceed stated reserves and insurance, requiring us to allocate additional funds and other resources to address these liabilities.

Loss of key personnel could hurt our business.

Our products and services are highly technical in nature. In general, only highly qualified and trained scientists have the necessary skills to develop and market our products and provide our services. In addition, some of our manufacturing positions are highly technical as well. We face intense competition for these professionals from our competitors, customers, marketing partners and other companies throughout our industry. We do not generally enter into employment agreements requiring these employees to continue in our employment for any period of time. Any failure on our part to hire, train, and retain a sufficient number of qualified professionals would seriously damage our business. Additionally, integration of acquired companies and businesses can be disruptive, causing key employees to leave. Further, we use stock options, restricted stock, restricted stock units/awards to provide incentive to these individuals to stay with us and to build long-term stockholder value. If our stock price fluctuates below the exercise price of these options or reduces the value of restricted stock and restricted stock units/awards, a key employee’s incentive to stay is lessened. If we were to lose a sufficient number of our key employees, including research and development scientists, and were unable to replace them or satisfy our needs for research and development through outsourcing, these losses could seriously damage our business.

We have a significant amount of debt, which could adversely affect our financial condition.

We have $500 million of subordinated convertible notes that are due in 2006, $350 million of senior convertible notes that are due in 2023, and $450 million of senior convertible notes due in 2024. In addition, the holders of our $350 million of senior convertible notes have the option to require us to redeem the notes for cash at par value in August of 2010, 2013 or 2018. The holders of our $450 million senior convertible notes have the option to require us to redeem the notes for cash at par value in February of 2012, 2017 or 2022. If we are unable to generate sufficient cash flow or otherwise obtain funds necessary to make required payments on these notes, we will be in default under the terms of the loan agreements or indentures, which could, in turn, cause defaults under the remainder of these existing and any future debt obligations.

Even if we are able to meet our debt service obligations, the amount of debt we have could adversely affect us in a number of ways, including by:

We could lose the tax deduction on our convertible senior notes due 2023 and the convertible senior notes due 2024 under certain circumstances.

We could lose some or all of the tax deduction for interest expense associated with our convertible senior notes due 2023 and the convertible senior notes due in 2024 if, under certain circumstances, the foregoing notes

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are not subject to the special Treasury Regulations governing contingent payment debt instruments or the exchange of these notes is deemed to be a taxable exchange. We also could lose the tax deduction for interest expense associated with the foregoing notes if we were to invest in non-taxable investments.

Risks Related to Our International Operations

International unrest or foreign currency fluctuations could adversely affect our results.

Including subsidiaries and distributors, our products are currently marketed in approximately 70 countries throughout the world. Our international revenues, which include revenues from our non-U.S. subsidiaries and export sales from the U.S., represented 49% of our product revenues in 2004, 48% of our product revenues in 2003, and 44% of our product revenues in 2002. We expect that international revenues will continue to account for a significant percentage of our revenues for the foreseeable future. See Note 3 to the Notes to Consolidated Financial Statements.