What happened
Pharmaceutical companies depend on the patent protection they receive for their goods, so it's never a good day when it is stripped away. That was the misfortune suffered by global pharmaceutical company Novartis (NVS -1.64%) on Friday. Following a judge's invalidation of one of its better-selling drugs, the company's share price took a more than 3% hit. That was notably worse than the 0.3% slip of the S&P 500 index on the day.
So what
The latest decision in a long-running patent dispute over Novartis' heart drug Entresto was unfavorable to the company. Delaware District Court Judge Richard Andrews ruled that a Novartis patent covering the medication, plus combinations of sacubitril and valsartan, was invalid due to what he termed "lack of written description."
Novartis has spent years defending its Entresto patent. In 2019, it brought a lawsuit against a clutch of peers on the basis that generic versions being developed constituted infringement.
Novartis detailed its objection to the ruling in a press release issued on Friday. In it, the pharmaceutical giant said that it "will continue to defend vigorously its intellectual property rights relating to Entresto, including the combination patent as well as multiple patents covering additional innovations."
It took pains to point out that no generic version of the drug has yet won approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
Now what
In the press release, Novartis insisted that the legal setback would not materially affect its financial performance. It said it is maintaining its full-year 2023 guidance, which includes a forecast of mid-single-digit percentage rate growth in total sales.
