At Biovail Corp.'s annual meeting Wednesday, shareholders will put to rest the ongoing dispute between the Canadian drug developer's current and former management, when they vote on a slate of board candidates.
The vote will end a showdown between former Chairman and Chief Executive Eugene Melnyk and current management. Melnyk retired last year as he and the company came under investigation for accounting fraud.
He has proposed an alternate board slate after criticizing the company's financial performance. The company has urged shareholders to vote against Melnyk's director nominees.
Biovail has booked legal expenses of more than $255 million, or about $175 million net of insurance recoveries, and a subsidiary in May agreed to pay nearly $25 million to settle federal criminal charges that it illegally paid doctors so that they would prescribe a blood pressure drug during its launch in 2003.
Earlier this month the company reaffirmed its plan to focus drug development on central nervous systems disorders. Biovail plans on investing $600 million through 2012 on research and development, with the focus moving to treatments for epilepsy, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson's disease. That market has a global opportunity of about $70 billion, Biovail has said.
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