On October 20, 2009, Wyeth (now Pfizer, as of last week!) was issued a fairly-broad patent -- one covering various aspects of the vaccination process, for a type of viral infection often seen in piglets.
That same day, it filed a rather ponderous suit against Schering's Intervet Animal Health businesses (and BIVI, the company that bought some Pfizer/Wyeth animal health assets at FTC suggestion last week, in order to clear the path for Pfizer to close the acquisition of Wyeth -- but that's another story!), alleging willful infringement in the manufacture and sale of the Intervet line of porcine Circumvent® and Porcilis® vaccines.
Declaring the infringing conduct "willful" means that Pfizer may potentially triple its recovery -- under the relevant patent statutes, should it prevail in showing that Intervet acted "willfully" in producing the porcine circovirus vaccines in the face of the pending Wyeth patent application. [Click the image at right to enlarge, and read the operative portion of the Wyeth-cum-Pfizer complaint.] Pfizer has also demanded that the case be tried before a jury, in the Delaware federal District court.
Hat tip to the Patent Docs.org blog for this:
. . . .Wyeth v. Intervet Inc., et al., (1:09-cv-00780; filed October 20, 2009 in the District Court of Delaware). . . .
Infringement of U.S. Patent No. 7,604,808 ("Circovirus Sequences Associated with Piglet Weight Loss Disease") based on defendant's manufacture and sale of their Circumvent® and Porcilis® vaccines (porcine circovirus vaccines). . . .
8 comments:
Not a huge deal, really, just one more of the ENDLESS patent lawsuits for circovirus involving SP, BI, Ft.Dodge/Pfizer, and Merial. All a little more convoluted these days, obviously. Sooner or later these will all settle out.
While I agree that even a large shift in the porcine virus vaccine markets will not move the needle (very much) at either Merck/Schering-Plough, or at Pfizer/Wyeth -- what is interesting to me is the amount of money spent on back and forth here.
If the allegations are accurate, that -- instead of developing its own novel vaccine -- Old Organon/Intervet/Schering cum Merck simply "appropriated" patent-pending technology belonging to Old Wyeth (by assignment) cum Pfizer. . .
What does it say about the company's belief in its own research capabilities?
That said, I do think it more likely than not that the companies will work out a cross-license and royalty sharing settlement of this litigation.
Thanks for your perspective! Do stop back.
Namaste
Condor;
Did you see this:
http://blog.pharmaconduct.org/2009/10/merckschering-survey-need-your-input.html#
IF the allegations are accurate is a big step. I would never take the pleadings of one party as accurate -- ever. This particular matter is wrapped up in the Merial-SP patent lawsuit as well, one in which SP has been very successful, including getting summary judgement against Merial re non-infringement and validity of SP's patent.
SP, don't you mean Intervet?
Well, Intervet as an SP company, I suppose. For now, that's still the case.
what is the general consensus among experts as to wether Intervet/merial combo is possible from a regulatory perspective?
I don't know that there will be any general consensus, but I do think the deal is possible -- it will require several significant divestitures -- especially in Europe -- by one party or the other.
Just search "Merial" here on the site, to see my various guesses, mostly in August of 2009.
Namaste
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