Ranbaxy Laboratories Ltd. received rejection at the United Kingdom High Court of Justice on Thursday as the court gave a ruling in favour of Pfizer, the world’s biggest drug company, over patents covering its best selling drug, Lipitor.
Ranbaxy will now not be allowed to early launch the cheaper version of Pfizer's Lipitor, which is a cholesterol-lowering drug. However, the verdict is a big reason for celebration at Pfizer that would have cost it millions had it lost the case.
The Judge, Nicholas Pumfrey at the high court supported the patent protecting the chief constituent of Lipitor, atorvastatin, which extended to November 2011, while he declared the second patent until July 2010 invalid.
While Pfizer will now be able to save its drug worth as much as $12-billion of global sales in UK from generic competitors, Ranbaxy’s 2006 introduction of its Lipitor version will have to be delayed.
Ranbaxy clearly stated that it would file against the court’s verdict saying, “Justice Pumfrey ruled that one of Pfizer's patents is invalid but that Ranbaxy's atorvastatin (active ingredient) product infringed another patent. Andrew Waugh QC, will represent the company on the appeal.”
At the same time, victorious Chairman and CEO at Pfizer, Hank McKinnell, said, “This is an important victory not only for Pfizer but for all innovators pursuing high-risk medical discoveries that benefit current and future generations of patients around the world.” Besides, he notified that the company would appeal against the court’s ruling of the second patent’s invalidity that covered atorvastatin’s calcium salt.
Meanwhile, experts watching the courtroom saga for quite some time now felt that this incident would prevent generic companies in India from battling issues concerning patents, as “this just goes to show the high-risk nature of the pharma business.” Even last year saw Dr Reddy's Laboratories restricted from US trading its generic version of amlodipine maleate, which is Pfizer's hypertension drug.
Posted
on : Fri, 14 Oct 2005 07:35 GMT | General News
By : Salim Patel
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