Teva and Barr settle patent dispute

Albany Molecular Research (AMRI) announced this morning an agreement with Teva Pharmaceuticals and Barr Laboratories to settle patent infringement litigation. The settlement involved the U.S. dispute over Allegra and Allegra D-12 between Teva, Barr and Sanofi-Aventis.

The settlement will result in an amended licensing agreement between AMRI and Sanofi-Aventis, which will allow Sanofi-Aventis to sublicense the patents to Teva and Barr. Sanofi-Aventis will pay ARMI $10 million in sublicensing fees.

Sanofi-Aventis will continue to pay royalties to AMRI for the products, as well as for authorized generics, for the remaining term of the patents, but sales of products outside of the United States will be unchanged. The royalties will be on all products containing fexofenadine hydrochloride, or combinations of fexofenadine hydrochloride and pseudoephedrine hydrochloride, generic ingredients in Allegra and Allegra D-12.

While the settlement protects patents only having to do with companies in the current litigation, there will be ongoing patent infringement litigation for other makers of generics in the U.S. and abroad.

- view the AMRI release [1]
- check out the Teva release
[2]- see what Barr had to say
[3]- read the story [4] in the Wall Street Journal
- see what BusinessWeek said [5]

Related Articles:
Courts more open to patent-busting [6]
Patent 'cliff' looms for Big Pharma [7] (May 2007)