The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) spent the better part of a decade attacking the practice of innovator drug companies settling ANDA litigation by providing payments to generic applicants challenging the validity of Orange...more
On December 3, 2020, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) published its annual report on pharmaceutical patent settlements filed with the FTC under the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003...more
In 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court rendered its decision in FTC v. Actavis, finding that although so-called reverse payment settlement agreements were not per se antitrust violations in cases brought against generic drug makers...more
It has been over three years since the Supreme Court’s Actavis decision. Since then, numerous putative class actions alleging harm to competition as a result of “reverse-payment” settlements have flooded the courts. The...more
180-Day Notice Period for Biosimilar Approval Is Always Mandatory and Enforceable by Injunction - Amgen Inc., v. Apotex Inc., (Fed. Cir. July 5, 2016) - A year after analyzing the patent dance and notice...more
Patent settlement agreements were traditionally deemed outside the purview of antitrust scrutiny unless the patent holder’s conduct fell outside the legitimate scope of the patent’s exclusionary power. This all changed when...more
Federal Circuit Interprets Statutory Requirements for Biosimilar Regulatory Pathway - Amgen Inc., v. Sandoz Inc., (Fed. Cir. July 21, 2015): In a case of first impression, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal...more
Recently, the Third Circuit issued the first federal appellate decision interpreting the Supreme Court's landmark decision in FTC v. Actavis, Inc.[1], potentially greatly expanding the scope of settling parties in reverse...more
In This Issue: - INTRODUCTION - WHAT ARE REVERSE PAYMENT SETTLEMENT AGREEMENTS? ..The Basic Framework of Hatch-Waxman Litigation ..The Federal Trade Commission’s View of Reverse Payment Settlements and Its...more
“Reverse Payment” Settlements Face Greater Antitrust Scrutiny Following U.S. Supreme Court Ruling in FTC v. Actavis: Federal Trade Commission v. Actavis, Inc. - Resolving a split among the U.S. Courts of Appeals, the...more
In Federal Trade Commission v. Actavis, Inc., the Supreme Court, in a 5-3 decision written by Justice Breyer, reversed the Eleventh Circuit's dismissal of an FTC complaint under Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act...more
On June 17, 2013, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled 5-3 in favor of the Federal Trade Commission and issued its long-awaited decision in Federal Trade Commission v. Actavis, Inc. et al. 570 U.S. __ (2013), Slip Op....more
By rejecting the “scope of the patent” test and holding that reverse payment patent settlements “can sometimes violate the antitrust laws,” the Supreme Court of the United States subjects such settlements to greater antitrust...more
In Federal Trade Commission v. Actavis, Inc., the Supreme Court held that reverse payment (“pay-for-delay”) settlement agreements made in the context of settling Hatch-Waxman ANDA litigation should be evaluated for antitrust...more
This week, the Supreme Court announced that “reverse payment” settlements of patent litigation between branded and generic pharmaceutical companies are, when challenged in a subsequent antitrust case, to be judged under the...more
The Supreme Court ruled 5-3 on June 17, 2013 in favor of the Federal Trade Commission in FTC v. Actavis. Writing for the majority that included Justices Kennedy, Ginsburg, Sotomayor and Kagan, Justice Breyer’s opinion...more
In Federal Trade Commission v. Actavis, Inc., No. 12-416, 2013 U.S. LEXIS 4545 (U.S. June 17, 2013), the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the Eleventh Circuit decision in FTC v. Watson Pharmaceuticals, Inc., 677 F.3d 1298 (2012),...more
The U.S. Supreme Court yesterday ruled on the long-awaited FTC v. Actavis case concerning ANDA reverse payments, resolving a sharp circuit split. The Court held that settlement agreements that include reverse payments to end...more
The Supreme Court ruled 5-3 today in favor of the Federal Trade Commission in FTC v. Actavis, Inc. Writing for the majority that included Justices Kennedy, Ginsburg, Sotomayor and Kagan, Justice Breyer's opinion reversed the...more
Today, the U.S. Supreme Court held in Federal Trade Commission v. Actavis, Inc. that so-called “reverse payment” settlement agreements should be analyzed under a rule-of-reason analysis under which the court assesses any...more
The Supreme Court heard oral argument in Federal Trade Commission v. Actavis (the caption for what was Federal Trade Commission v. Watson Pharmaceuticals, Inc. in the 11th Circuit opinion below) last Monday, with Deputy...more
[Ed. The Supreme Court heard oral argument today in Federal Trade Commission v. Watson Pharmaceuticals. While Patent Docs will provide analysis regarding the oral argument in a subsequent post, we provide the following...more
Last week, Senator Al Franken (D-MN) was joined by Senators David Vitter (R-LA), Dick Durbin (D-IL), Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), and Bernie Sanders (I-VT) in introducing S. 204, the "Fair and Immediate Release of Generic Drugs...more
Par PharmaceuticalPar/Paddock, one of the generic drug company defendants in FTC v. Actavis Inc. et al. (the "reverse payment" ANDA settlement case now before the Supreme Court) filed its reponsive brief last week. In it,...more
Whether ANDA litigation has had a positive or negative impact on generic drug availability is an open question, in view of several recent reports looking at the effects such litigation has had on both branded and generic...more