Patent losses force change for Sanofi
pharmafile | October 3, 2012 | News story | Sales and Marketing | Avapro, BMS, Plavix, Sanofi, patent loss
Patent expiries are behind the decision by Sanofi and Bristol-Myers Squibb to radically restructure their long-term corporate alliance.
The loss of exclusivity for previously big earners – heart drug Plavix and hypertension drug Avapro – has forced the companies to rethink the way they do business with one another.
From 1 January next year, BMS is giving Sanofi back the rights to Plavix and Avapro/Avalide in all markets – except for Plavix in the US and Puerto Rico – giving Sanofi virtually a free hand with both products.
Meanwhile BMS will continue to receive royalties on Sanofi’s sales of branded and unbranded Plavix worldwide, outside of those two countries – and for Avapro/Avalide worldwide – until 2018.
BMS will then be in line for a final payment of $200 million from Sanofi in December 2018, while Plavix rights in the US and Puerto Rico will continue unchanged for another year after that.
“This revised agreement simplifies operations and supports BMS’s ability to focus on delivering our promising, innovation-driven R&D portfolio and setting the foundation for future success,” said BMS chief executive Lamberto Andreotti.
As part of the re-jigged agreement, BMS will have to shell out a one-off payment of $80 million to Sanofi as a settlement for disruption to the Avalide supply chain in the US in 2011.
With other major drugs going off-patent in the near future, this is unlikely to be the last such restructure in the pharma industry but Sanofi’s president of global operations, Hanspeter Spek, said the new deal “further supports Sanofi’s strategic priorities”.
Sanofi has made strenous efforts to find other revenue streams, buying US biotech company Genzyme for $20.1 billion last year and putting faith in the development of personalised medicines.
The French pharma group recently announced it was to cut 900 jobs in France by 2015 and it has shed 4,000 jobs between 2009 and 2011.
BMS, for its part, shed 10% of its workforce – around 4,300 jobs – between 2007 and 2010, and made $2.5 billion in savings over the last three years.
Adam Hill
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