Well -- If There Is No Gilead Sovaldi® (Sofosbuvir) Patent Settlement Prior, December 10, 2015 Is Summary Judgment Day

Now that Merck controls the entire left side of the "Vs.", in this patent spat with Gilead (a fight over who owns the method for making sofosbuvir therapeutic in humans -- via a metabolite), it will be interesting to see if Whitehouse Station will actually try to press for something closer to the 10 per cent royalty on all the billions of dollars of sales it earlier sought.

It is obviously true that if a smaller company, one like say. . . Idenix, had agreed independently to a say one percent royalty, it would be hard for Merck to argue, with a straight face, that 10 per cent would be a "fair market" royalty demand. Now that impediment has been removed, as of the closing of the Idenix tender offer, this morning. [My earler 2014 backgrounder here.]

So -- these are the latest Northern California (San Jose) federal District Court's scheduling order dates -- entered yesterday -- should this matter go forward. Me(?), I predict a. . . settlement -- at what royalty rate? Who knows? But Christmas 2015 could prove rather interesting, if there is no settlement -- on this perhaps $13 billion a year drug, by then. Here you go:

. . . .Summary Judgment Motions Filed | October 29, 2015

Oppositions to Summary Judgment Motions Filed | November 12, 2015

Replies in Further Support of Summary Judgment Motions Filed | November 19, 2015

Hearing on Summary Judgment Motions | December 10, 2015. . . .

We will keep you posted, if it hasn't settled by Thanksgiving, a year from now.