Allergan agreed to pay $300 million to settle a lawsuit claiming two of its subsidiaries, Warner Chilcott and Watson Pharmaceuticals, partnered in a pay-for-delay deal that violated antitrust laws, the drugmaker said Jan. 6.
The lawsuit, filed in 2013, claimed Warner Chilcott entered into agreements with Watson and generic drugmaker Lupin Pharmaceuticals to delay a generic version of Loestrin 24 FE from coming to market, according to Cohen Milstein law firm, a co-lead counsel in the case. Loestrin 24 FE is a birth control pill.
Warner sought to delay competition to inflate its prices of the birth control pill, according to the lawsuit. The lawsuit also alleges that Warner withheld from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office a study that either wasn't sufficient or would have proved Loestrin 24 FE had been in public use for a year, making it ineligible for a patent.
The case was set to go to trial Jan. 6, the day the settlement was reached. The settlement makes no admission of wrongdoing on Allergan's part.
Read the full news release here.