Life Sciences

  • March 21, 2024

    Avoid Major Extension Of Merger Reach, EU High Court Urged

    An important tool for extending European Union antitrust officials' merger scrutiny appears to be in jeopardy after a European Court of Justice advocate general effectively recommended Thursday that the bloc's high court restrict the ability to investigate transactions that don't normally trigger EU thresholds.

  • March 21, 2024

    Business Coalition Rebuffs Biden Plan To Seize Drug Patents

    The Biden administration's proposal to exercise so-called march-in rights to seize drug patents would harm innovation in the U.S., according to an assemblage of business-focused groups.

  • March 21, 2024

    Home Health Cos. Stiffed Workers On OT Pay, Suit Claims

    The operators of several Ohio-based home care staffing agencies have been failing to pay their employees for all the overtime hours they worked, according to a recent proposed class and collective action.

  • March 21, 2024

    Teleflex Catheter Patent Makes It Through Fed. Circ.

    The Federal Circuit on Thursday opted to leave untouched an administrative patent board ruling that rejected a legal effort to invalidate a patent covering a type of catheter that's sold by Teleflex. 

  • March 21, 2024

    Woman Lost Independence Due To Strattice Mesh, Jurors Told

    A Kentucky woman told New Jersey state jurors on Thursday that LifeCell skipped important safety steps while designing its Strattice surgical mesh, and that those skipped steps caused a hernia to reoccur and ultimately resulted in the loss of her independence.

  • March 21, 2024

    3rd Circ. Agrees Investors Have No Case Against Vax Maker

    The Third Circuit on Thursday upheld a Pennsylvania federal judge's ruling that a putative class of investors alleging biopharmaceutical company Ocugen Inc. made misleading statements about its ability to quickly produce a COVID-19 vaccine failed to state a claim against the company.

  • March 21, 2024

    6th Circ. Doubtful Of Hospital Workers' Vax Exemption Claim

    A Sixth Circuit panel appeared skeptical Thursday of an argument from a class of former employees of Ohio Children's Hospital that their First Amendment rights to freedom of religion were violated under the hospital's COVID-19 employee vaccination policy.

  • March 21, 2024

    Fed. Circ. Upholds Edwards' PTAB Win On Heart Valve Patent

    The Federal Circuit has affirmed a Patent Trial and Appeal Board finding that various parts of medical technology maker Cardiovalve's patent on an artificial heart valve implant were invalid as obvious.

  • March 21, 2024

    6th Circ. Zeroes In On CBA In Vax Bias Preemption Battle

    A Sixth Circuit panel pressed on Thursday a cargo airline and pilots who say they were unlawfully fired for refusing COVID-19 vaccinations about the pilots' union contract, with one judge asking whether the open questions about their collective bargaining agreement meant the discrimination case was preempted.

  • March 21, 2024

    Chancery Denies Icahn Midcase Appeal In Illumina Board Suit

    Carl Icahn can't interrupt his Chancery Court lawsuit against biotech Illumina Inc.'s board to appeal a decision about redactions to the Delaware Supreme Court, a vice chancellor ruled Wednesday, saying there are no "exceptional circumstances" that call for a midcase review.

  • March 21, 2024

    Greenberg Traurig Adds Jackson Walker FDA Pro In Houston

    Greenberg Traurig LLP's most recent Houston addition is a shareholder who came aboard from Jackson Walker LLP, where he established and led its U.S. Food and Drug Administration practice.

  • March 20, 2024

    4th Circ. Backs Rockefeller Group in Guatemalans' Syphilis Suit

    A group of Guatemalans who sued The Rockefeller Foundation over venereal disease experiments conducted on prisoners and psychiatric patients in the 1940s did not show an American doctor involved in the gruesome activities acted on behalf of the organization, a Fourth Circuit panel ruled Wednesday.

  • March 20, 2024

    Endo Plan To Trim $5B In Debt Confirmed By NY Judge

    Drugmaker Endo International got a New York bankruptcy judge's approval for its Chapter 11 plan that aims to cut more than $5 billion in debt and hand over ownership to its lenders, roughly a month after it finalized a $465 million deal to resolve criminal and civil opioid claims.

  • March 20, 2024

    PTAB To Analyze Moderna COVID Vaccine Patents

    The Patent Trial and Appeal Board has agreed to review two Moderna COVID-19 vaccine patents challenged by rivals Pfizer and BioNTech as having "unimaginably broad claims directed to a basic idea that was known long before."

  • March 20, 2024

    Jenner & Block-Led Lonza To Buy Roche's $1.2B US Facility

    Swiss healthcare company Lonza said on Wednesday that it has agreed to acquire one of the largest medicine manufacturing facilities in the world from biotech giant Roche for $1.2 billion to increase its manufacturing capacity.

  • March 20, 2024

    Digital Comms Filings Bolster Record EPO Applications

    Companies and inventors filed the highest number of European patent applications to date in 2023, buoyed by marked increases in filings for digital communications and energy technologies.

  • March 20, 2024

    Int'l Olympic Committee Rips Russia For Politicizing Sports

    The International Olympic Committee has slammed Russia's newly created "Friendship Games" as a cynical ploy to politicize sports, saying that the Russian government's plan to host its own summer and winter games runs contrary to resolutions by the United Nations General Assembly.

  • March 20, 2024

    Top Attorney For Bristol-Myers Squibb Earned $5.9M In '23

    The longtime general counsel for biopharma giant Bristol-Myers Squibb earned more than $5.9 million in compensation for last year, a figure that was down slightly from $6.1 million in 2022 but still buoyed by her work on its recent CEO transition and other matters.

  • March 20, 2024

    Boehringer Wins Diabetes Treatment Patent On Appeal In EU

    Boehringer Ingelheim saved its diabetes drug patent from the chopping block after a European appellate board ruled that the treatment for patients with moderately damaged kidneys was new and innovative despite eight oppositions.

  • March 20, 2024

    How The Supreme Court Could Narrow Chevron

    After hours of oral argument in a closely watched administrative law case, it appeared that some U.S. Supreme Court justices could be open to limiting the opportunities for lower courts to defer to federal agencies' legal interpretations in disputes over rulemaking — and legal experts said there are a number of ways they could do it.

  • March 20, 2024

    2 Biotechs Unveil Separate Fundings Totaling $325M

    Life sciences companies Clasp Therapeutics and Cooley-advised Capstan Therapeutics, which develop treatments for a range of health conditions including cancer and autoimmune diseases, separately announced funding rounds Wednesday that together total $325 million.

  • March 20, 2024

    Law360 Announces The Members Of Its 2024 Editorial Boards

    Law360 is pleased to announce the formation of its 2024 Editorial Advisory Boards.

  • March 20, 2024

    US Chamber's Litigation Funding Concerns Spur 2 State Laws

    Amid concerns from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce about third-party litigation funding, including from potentially hostile foreign entities, state legislatures in Indiana and West Virginia have recently passed bills imposing restrictions on the practice.

  • March 19, 2024

    Healthcare Policy Roundup: HHS Budget, Telehealth, PBMs

    Amid a government funding battle, work of interest to healthcare lawyers and agency watchers was getting done on federal legislation and policy in recent days.

  • March 19, 2024

    Schumer Scolds McConnell For Judge-Shopping Policy Rebuff

    Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer on Tuesday lauded the Judicial Conference's updated policy on random case assignments to prevent litigants from judge-shopping, saying that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is pushing back against the policy since it'd make it tough for hard-right partisans "to hijack our courts for their purposes."

Expert Analysis

  • The Fed. Circ. In Nov.: Factual Support And Appellate Standing

    The Federal Circuit's recent Allgenesis Biotherapeutics v. Cloud Break Therapeutics decision shows that appellate standing requires specific factual support, underscoring the necessary requirements for a patent challenger in an appeal from an inter partes review at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, say Jeremiah Helm and Sean Murray at Knobbe Martens.

  • White House Activity Is A Band-Aid For Regulating AI In Health

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    In the medium term, recent White House actions will have a greater impact on AI in the health care industry than Congress' sluggish efforts to regulate it, but ultimately legislation of AI's development and use in the health space will fall to Congress, say Wendell Bartnick and Vanessa Perumal at Reed Smith.

  • Understanding Discovery Obligations In Era Of Generative AI

    Excerpt from Practical Guidance
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    Attorneys and businesses must adapt to the unique discovery challenges presented by generative artificial intelligence, such as chatbot content and prompts, while upholding the principles of fairness, transparency and compliance with legal obligations in federal civil litigation, say attorneys at King & Spalding.

  • Kochava Ruling May Hint At Next Privacy Class Action Wave

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    The Southern District of California's recent ruling in Greenley v. Kochava and increasing complaints alleging that a consumer website is an illegal “pen register” due to the use of third-party marketing software tools foreshadow a new theory of liability for plaintiffs in privacy litigation, say attorneys at Crowell & Moring.

  • Forecasting The Impact Of High Court Debit Card Rule Case

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    John Delionado and Aidan Gross at Hunton consider how the U.S. Supreme Court's forthcoming ruling in a retailer's suit challenging a Federal Reserve rule on debit card swipe fees could affect agency regulations both new and old, as well as the businesses that might seek to challenge them.

  • Series

    ESG Around The World: Mexico

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    ESG has yet to become part of the DNA of the Mexican business model, but huge strides are being made in that direction, as more stakeholders demand that companies adopt, at the least, a modicum of sustainability commitments and demonstrate how they will meet them, says Carlos Escoto at Galicia Abogados.

  • Opinion

    FDA And Companies Must Move Quickly On Drug Recalls

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    When a drug doesn't work as promised — whether it causes harm, like eyedrops recalled last month by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, or is merely useless, like a widely used decongestant ingredient recently acknowledged by the agency to be ineffective — the public must be notified in a timely manner, says Vineet Dubey at Custodio & Dubey.

  • The Case For Post-Bar Clerk Training Programs At Law Firms

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    In today's competitive legal hiring market, an intentionally designed training program for law school graduates awaiting bar admission can be an effective way of creating a pipeline of qualified candidates, says Brent Daub at Gilson Daub.

  • Opinion

    A Telecom Attorney's Defense Of The Chevron Doctrine

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    The Chevron doctrine, which requires judicial deference to federal regulators, is under attack in two U.S. Supreme Court cases — and while most telecom attorneys likely agree that the Federal Communications Commission is guilty of overrelying on it, the problem is not the doctrine itself, says Carl Northrop at Telecommunications Law Professionals.

  • What's At Stake In Bystolic 'Side Deals' Litigation

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    In re: Bystolic Antitrust Litigation, which has oral argument set for next month, will likely shed light on how the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit views side deals, and could create a circuit split in pleading standards for reverse payment cases, say attorneys at Axinn.

  • 2 HHS Warnings Highlight Anti-Kickback Risks For Physicians

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    Two recent advisory opinions issued by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Inspector General involve different scenarios and rationales, but together they illustrate the OIG's focus on and disapproval of contractual joint ventures and other revenue-maximizing physician arrangements, say Robert Threlkeld and Elliott Coward at Morris Manning.

  • Attorneys Have An Ethical Duty To Protect The Judiciary

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    The tenor of public disagreement and debate has become increasingly hostile against judges, and though the legislative branch is trying to ameliorate this safety gap, lawyers have a moral imperative and professional requirement to stand with judges in defusing attacks against them and their rulings, says Deborah Winokur at Cozen O'Connor.

  • Cross-Market Implications In FTC's Anesthesia Complaint

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    The Federal Trade Commission's recent complaint against a private equity firm's acquisition of anesthesiology practices highlights the controversial issue of cross-market harm in health care provider mergers, and could provide important insights into how a court may view such theories of harm, say Christopher Lau and Dina Older Aguilar at Cornerstone Research.

  • FTC Orange Book Move Signals New Pharma Patent Scrutiny

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    The Federal Trade Commission's recent dispute against improper listing of drug patents in the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's Orange Book indicates heightened surveillance of the pharmaceutical industry, particularly where competition-related consequences of patent or regulatory processes are concerned, say attorneys at Fenwick.

  • AI Can Help Lawyers Overcome The Programming Barrier

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    Legal professionals without programming expertise can use generative artificial intelligence to harness the power of automation and other technology solutions to streamline their work, without the steep learning curve traditionally associated with coding, says George Zalepa at Greenberg Traurig.

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