US FTC chairman Jon Leibowitz to depart
This article was originally published in SRA
US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) chairman Jon Leibowitz, has announced plans to leave the government. He is slated to step down on 15 February after holding the top job for four years at an agency, where he has served since September 2004.
Mr Leibowitz has been a thorn in the side of drug makers, fighting to stop the so-called pay-for-delay deals, in which innovators pay generic firms through patent settlement agreements to delay entrance onto the US market of the cheaper versions of medicines.
Mr Leibowitz is leaving a month before a landmark pay-for-delay case goes before the US Supreme Court, which will hear oral arguments on 25 March in an appeal brought by the FTC in which the Eleventh Circuit last April upheld a lower court's ruling to dismiss the case the government brought in February 2009 challenging agreements between Solvay Pharmaceuticals, now part of Abbott, and generic firms Watson Pharmaceuticals, Paddock Laboratories and Par Pharmaceutical2.
Under those settlements, Solvay paid the three generic manufacturers to delay entrance into the US market until 2015 of their competitors to the branded company's testosterone-replacement drug, AndroGel, which has annual sales of more than $400 million.
Last month, the FTC reported that the pay-for-delay deals jumped from 28 in fiscal year 2011 to 40 in FY 2012 – the highest since 20033.
References
1. FTC press release, 1 February 2013, www.ftc.gov/opa/2013/02/jdl.shtm
2. US Supreme Court to decide on legality of pay-for-delay drug settlements, Scrip Regulatory Affairs, 11 December 2012
3. US FTC: pay-for-delay deals jump, Scrip Regulatory Affairs, 24 January 2013