LONDON (Dow Jones) - Swiss drugmaker Novartis on Tuesday said third-quarter profit rose 13%, helped by its Gleevec leukemia drug, Diovan blood pressure treatment and the acquisitions of Hexal and Eon Labs.

Novartis (NVS) said profit in the quarter rose to $1.67 billion, or 71 cents per U.S. share, from $1.47 billion , or 62 cents, helped by a 19% increase in sales at $8.42 billion .

That topped consensus EPS estimates of 66 cents on revenue of $8.23 billion .

Swiss-listed Novartis shares rose 2.7%.

Sales at its generic making Sandoz unit jumped dramatically to $1.49 billion from $722 million on the Hexal and Eon Labs acquisitions.

At its main pharmaceuticals division, sales rose 10% at $5.1 billion, with Diovan sales up 17% at $925 million and Gleevec sales rising 33% to $547 million .

Merrill Lynch noted two areas of outperformance - lower charges for the Hexal and Eon Labs acquisition than it expected, as well a "very strong" pharmaceuticals operating margin, which rose 2.8 percentage points during the quarter.

"Importantly this is mostly due to lower selling, general and administrative expenses, an area that the market has been skeptical that Novartis would be able to exhibit control over," the brokerage said.

Looking forward, Novartis reiterated its goal for high single-digit sales growth in 2005, and said its LAF237 diabetes drug candidate is due to be filed with U.S. regulators in the first half of 2006 and its SPP100 anti-hypertension agent is due for U.S. submission in early 2006.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

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