In March 2021, our experienced intellectual property, antitrust, and health care litigation lawyers shared some predictions on antitrust policy and enforcement in the health care sector. In “Health Care Antitrust under...more
On February 3, 2020, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) issued a joint statement announcing their plans to collaborate in promoting competitive biological product markets and...more
A new California law, Preserving Access to Affordable Drugs, AB-824 (the Act), which is aimed at curbing reverse-payment patent settlements, took effect on January 1. The Act codifies a presumption that any transfer of value...more
On October 26, the Boston Patent Law Association will host a panel featuring Judge William Young to discuss the legal landscape following the Supreme Court’s 2014 opinion in Actavis v. FTC...more
On August 8, the District of Connecticut issued a noteworthy ruling on how to approach defining the relevant market definition in a pay-for-delay suit. In In re Aggrenox Antitrust Litigation, 3:14-md-02516 (D. Conn.), three...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
The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania ordered AbbVie, Inc. and Besins Healthcare to produce unredacted documents to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), because the documents were relevant to the...more
Last week I posted on the European Commission’s (EC) latest report into patent settlement agreements between originator and generic companies in the European Union (EU). The EC says each time it produces these reports that...more
In the first decision by a federal appeals court interpreting the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark ruling in FTC v. Actavis, the Third Circuit recently held in King Drug Co. of Florence v. SmithKline Beecham Corp. that so-called...more
Recently, the FTC announced that it reached a settlement in its pay-for-delay lawsuit, FTC v. Cephalon Inc. in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, with Teva Pharmaceuticals Industries, Ltd.,...more
The Federal Trade Commission staff recently issued a report detailing the number of “potential pay-for-delay settlements” that took place in fiscal year 2013. The FTC is a staunch opponent of so-called “pay-for-delay”—also...more
In two recent statements, the FTC reaffirmed its intention aggressively to pursue reverse-payment patent settlement agreements in the pharmaceutical industry. ...more
In this Issue: - New Developments - U.S. Supreme Court Will Decide Whether Patent Agreements That Postpone the Sale of Generic Drugs Violate Antitrust Laws - Direct Purchasers Have Standing to Bring Antitrust...more
In a recent interview, Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Bureau of Competition chairwoman Deborah Feinstein announced that targeting pay-for-delay arrangements by pharmaceutical companies would continue as a top priority for the...more
United States antitrust laws seek to encourage free and open competition by preventing exclusionary conduct that threatens the competitive process. Intellectual property rights (IPR) laws, by contrast, are designed to...more
A divided Supreme Court recently held in an opinion by Justice Breyer that “reverse payment” or “pay for delay” agreements between patent holders and potential competitors are not immune from scrutiny under antitrust laws....more
Antitrust challenges to so-called “pay-for-delay” settlements in drug patent suits are allowed under the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in Federal Trade Commission v. Actavis, Inc....more
On June 17, 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court determined that the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) antitrust challenge to a reverse payment settlement agreement between drug manufacturers, otherwise known as a “pay-for-delay”...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
In the most significant patent antitrust decision in decades, Federal Trade Commission v. Actavis, Inc., No. 12-416, 2013 WL 2922122 (June 17, 2013), the Supreme Court has held, by a 5-3 vote with Justice Alito recused, that...more
SUMMARY OF DECISION - In FTC v. Actavis, Inc., 570 U.S. ____ (Slip Op. June 17, 2013), the Supreme Court addressed for the first time the underlying antitrust merits of the Federal Trade Commission’s long-running...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