Bridion® (sugammadex) - Case Name: Merck Sharp & Dohme B.V. v. Aurobindo Pharma USA, Inc., No. 2023-2254, 2025 WL 795317 (Fed. Cir. Mar. 13, 2025) (Circuit Judges Dyk, Mayer, and Reyna presiding; Opinion by Dyk, C.J.) (Appeal...more
The Federal Circuit held in Merck Sharp & Dohme B.V. v. Aurobindo Pharma USA, Inc., 23-2254 that a reissued patent receives patent term extension (PTE) based on the issue date of the original patent, not the reissue patent,...more
Merck Sharp & Dohm B.V. v. Aurobindo Pharma USA, Inc. et al (Fed. Cir. March 13, 2025) - The Hatch-Waxman Act seeks to strike a balance in the pharmaceutical industry by incentivizing drugs makers to develop innovative...more
Addressing the calculation of patent term extensions (PTEs) under the Hatch-Waxman Act, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed a district court decision that under the act the issue date of the original...more
The Patent Term Extension (PTE) provisions of 35 U.S.C. § 156 compensate pharmaceutical patent owners for time they are not able to enjoy commercial market exclusivity because their products are not yet approved by the U.S....more
Early last year, Aurobindo, one of the Defendants* in ANDA litigation against Merck, advanced the proposition that in cases where a patent had been reissued patent term extension ("PTE") under 35 U.S.C. § 156 should be...more
On March 13, 2025, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed a five-year patent term extension (“PTE”) for Merck’s sugammadex patent, holding that the district court had correctly calculated PTE based on the...more
The Federal Circuit heard oral argument in Auribundo's appeal of the district court's decision in favor of plaintiff Merck, in a case captioned In re Sugammadex (alternatively, Aurobindo v. Merck Sharp and Dohme). The issue...more
The Federal Circuit appeal in Merck Sharp & Dohme B.V., Merck Sharp & Dohme, LLC v. Aurobindo Pharma USA, Inc. et al., concerns whether patent term extension (PTE) for regulatory delay, in particular delay for FDA drug...more
Addressing for the first time how patent term adjustments (PTAs) interact with obviousness-type double patenting (ODP), the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit concluded that when members of a patent family have...more
In re Cellect, LLC, Appeal Nos. 2022-1293, -1294, -1295, -1296 (Fed. Cir. Aug. 28, 2023) In a significant appeal from ex parte reexamination proceedings before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board, the Federal Circuit...more
Last week, the Federal Circuit held that obviousness-type double patenting trumps patent term adjustment, opening the door for invalidity attacks that to date had been questionable. In re Cellect was an appeal from a...more
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed a grant of summary judgment for the Director of the US Patent and Trademark Office (PTO), holding that the statutory language authorizing so-called “C-delay” patent...more
Recently, the Federal Circuit issued its holding in a case dealing with asserting claims of an extended patent covering administration of dimethyl fumarate formulations to treat multiple sclerosis (MS). Dimethyl fumarate...more
In 1984, Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) shepherded a grand legislative compromise through Congress that balanced the rights and solved inefficient regulatory consequences for both branded and generic...more
In two recent decisions, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit found that an asserted patent was not invalid due to obviousness-type double patenting (1) when a patent filed post-Uruguay Round Agreements Act of 1994...more
In a pair of patent owner victories, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued decisions limiting the applicability of obviousness-type double patenting — known as OTDP — to invalidate or limit the term of...more
Standing Committee on Health proposes National Pharmacare program, modifications to prescription and generic drug pricing - While common among member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development...more
There have been many voices raised in recent years against the patent system for a variety of political, policy, or personal reasons. Indeed, there is even a book entitled Don't File a Patent that sets out the authors'...more