Jury Issues Mixed Ruling in Regeneron v. Amgen Case

Case Background

This case arose under federal antitrust law, with additional claims based on unfair competition and tortious conduct.  The Plaintiff, Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc., filed the complaint in the United States District Court for the District of Delaware.  The issue involves Regeneron's cholesterol-lowering medicine, Praluent (alirocumab), and its direct competitor, Repatha (evolocumab), which was manufactured and distributed by the Defendant, Amgen Inc.  Regeneron claimed that Amgen used exclusionary and anticompetitive practices to remove Praluent from the market in order to maintain and expand Amgen's monopoly position in the market for PCSK9 inhibitors critical drugs used to lower LDL-C or "bad cholesterol" in high-risk patients.

Events That Led to the Dispute:

Regeneron had introduced Praluent as the first FDA-approved PCSK9 inhibitor in 2015. Around the same time, Amgen had also launched Repatha, a similar but structurally distinct drug. Both had competed for the same high-risk cardiovascular patient population. Amgen had initially tried to eliminate Praluent through an aggressive patent litigation campaign, seeking a court injunction to bar its sale. When the courts had invalidated Amgen’s patents ruling that they had overreached by claiming millions of antibody compounds they had not invented Amgen had turned to commercial tactics. It had allegedly devised an anticompetitive bundling scheme that tied discounts on its high-revenue, unrelated drugs (like Otezla and Enbrel) to exclusive or near-exclusive formulary placement of Repatha over Praluent. Amgen’s strategy had threatened third-party payors with financial penalties if they included Praluent on their