Pfizer files two suits against Ranbaxy to block Lipitor clones

According to a recent Value Votes study, India has the potential to attract legal services worth $ 4.5 billion by 2010. Within the next 4 to 5 years, there will be an opening of career specialization opportunities for the legal sector for over 850, 000 lawyers in India. India already has the second largest number of lawyers in the world after the US. In addition to the existing pool, the country’s 500 law schools including the prestigious national law schools produce around 20,00 law graduates a year of which 30% join law firms, 50% get into private practice, 10% pursue higher studies while the rest join NGOs. According to the study, the legal services off shoring industry will employ about 24,000 lawyers by 2010. Legal process outsourcing (LPO) is said to be emerging as a key vertical of the country’s entire knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) in the next couple of years. Salaries in the legal services are also set to boom. While currently a fresh lawyer in the US or Europe demands a pay package ranging from $ 250,000 to $300, 00 per annum, their Indian counterparts are only paid a starting salary of $7,000 to $20,000 per annum.

The US has taken a serious objection to India's new competition law that requires foreign companies to seek regulator's approval for mergers and acquisitions (M&As) made anywhere in the world. In a report submitted to the Congress, the US Trade Department said that it had taken up the issue with the Indian government to change the new regulation governing M&As under the amended Competition Act. In September 2007, the Indian government introduced new merger control amendments to its Competition Act. Under the new law, the government would impose a 210-day waiting period before the transaction could take place, even if it would have little or no impact on business within India. According to the report submitted to the congress, while most sectors of the Indian economy were now partially open to foreign investment, the Indian government continued to prohibit or severely restrict FDI in certain politically sensitive sectors, such as agriculture, retail trading, railways and real estate.

The Supreme Court has refused to provide any immediate relief to Ranbaxy which was pained by a Delhi High Court order directing it to change an advertisement for its pain relieving gel “Volini”. The ad appeared to target ‘Moov’, a similar product of manufactured by Para Pharma. Appearing for Ranbaxy, Senior Advocate Mokul Rohtagi had argued that except for the pink colour of the product that was being termed as useless in the advertisement, there was no similarity between ‘Moov’ and ‘Volini’. A Bench comprising of Chief Justice KG Balakrishnan and Justices RV Raveendran and Dalveer Bhandari said that the entire thing –colour and looks-appeared to be quite similar to the packaging of ‘Moov’.

In a bid to extend its monopoly of $ 13 billion of its anti-cholesterol drug Lipitor, Pfizer which is the world’s largest drugmaker, has filed two separate patent infringement cases against Ranbaxy Laboratories. Pfizer wanted to prevent Ranbaxy from launching generic versions of Lipitor (atorvastatin) and Caduet (a combination drug of Lipitor) until 2016 in the United States. The US drugmaker filed suits in the Delaware district courts alleging that Ranbaxy would infringe upon the process patents of both its drugs if it were to sell low-cost versions in the US market. Following various litigations, Ranbaxy Laboratories has been able to bring ahead the launch date of its generic version of Lipitor by 15 months to March 2010. The patent for the Lipitor expires in the US in July 2011.