Teva Wins Appeal That Upholds Three Patents for Migraine Drug

Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. won a U.S. appeals court ruling that upheld three patents on its Ajovy migraine drug, though six other patents on the treatment were ruled invalid.

Eli Lilly & Co., which makes the competing drug Emgality, had argued that all nine patents were invalid. The patents are part of an infringement suit Teva filed against Lilly in 2018 in federal court in Boston, right after Emgality won U.S. regulatory approval.

The patents relate to antibodies that target calcitonin gene-related peptide, a molecule linked to migraines. Teva had argued that the antibodies were discovered after “years of painstaking study” into CGRP for development of its migraine treatment, Ajovy.

Lilly argued that researchers already knew about CGRP and the Teva patents used known techniques for developing antibodies. While it was successful on six of the patents, three others covered a specific method of treatment that would not have had a “reasonable expectation of success,” the three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled in one of the three opinions covering the nine patents.

To contact the reporter on this story:
Susan Decker in Washington at sdecker1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Jon Morgan at jmorgan97@bloomberg.net

Elizabeth Wasserman

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