The Hindu Business Line : Patent infringement suit — Matrix Labs set to get Rs 95-cr settlement

MATRIX Laboratories Ltd (MLL), the Hyderabad-based pharmaceutical major, has informed the stock exchanges on Friday that it would be receiving an estimated lumpsum consideration of Rs 95 crore towards the settlement of a potential patent infringement suit.

This is being considered the highest amount received ever by an Indian pharmaceutical company, including the inventor companies. However, Matrix Labs officials declined to throw further light on the development.

"Under the terms of the agreement entered into with the multinational pharmaceutical company, which had filed the patent infringement suit against us, we are prohibited from disclosing details pertaining to the company that paid the lumpsum consideration and also the drug on which the suit was based," a senior Matrix official told Business Line.

This is the latest big success for the company after the Citalopram suit. During the last fiscal, the company recorded a victory in the patent infringement suit, where the Danish pharmaceutical giant Lundbeck, the innovator of the anti-depressant blockbuster drug Citalopram, had withdrawn patent infringement cases against Matrix Labs and its customers in the European Courts.

Matrix Labs was supplying Citalopram in the active pharmaceutical ingredient form to two of its major generic customers in the European markets — Ratiopharm and Destin Pharma. Following the development, Matrix recorded a significant increase in Citalopram exports to European markets.

With a strong synthetic research and process development capabilities, the company has so far filed 38 patents. It filed eight DMFs with the US FDA during the last quarter. Four process innovation patents were also filed during the quarter.

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