I know this story about the generic release of Plavix requires some knowledge of how the pharmaceutical industry works, but it’s a really funny tale of corporate manuevering. The CEO of the generic company (Apotex) gives an interview with the Times in which he goofs on Bristol-Myers Squibb and Sanofi-Aventis as a couple of pikers:
Mr. Sherman, in a telephone interview, all but ridiculed his two big rivals, saying they had naïvely agreed to conditions that allowed his company to bring [generic Plavix] to market even though the deal was rejected by regulators.
“I think they acted foolishly in a number of ways,†said Mr. Sherman, a Toronto billionaire who amassed his fortune in the generic drug business.
Mr. Sherman said that he had never expected the American government to approve the deal, but that he had conducted the negotiations in a way to let him push the Apotex drug onto the market.
The twist is that BMS & SA were trying to use a loophole agreement with Apotex to keep generic Plavix off the market till 2011. Instead, the deal got shot down, but its side-provisions give Apotex 5 business days to push its drug into the distribution chain before they can lodge a complaint. So Sherman’s company is trying to get as much as $1 billion in product out before any injunction can stop it.
I know it’s another business article, but you oughtta give it a read, just for Sherman’s incredulous take on the agreement.