The state asserts that Teva infringed intellectual property rights during the development of the multiple sclerosis medicine with a longer gap between doses.
The State of Israel has launched a $100 million lawsuit against Teva Pharmaceutical Industries in the Lod District Court, alleging that the company breached its rights by not paying royalties for the multiple sclerosis drug Copaxone.
Copaxone was developed at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, and Teva had commercial rights. Teva first offered the medicine in daily dosages, but when the patent for the active component expired, the company submitted a patent application for extended interval dosage. The state asserts that the longer interval dose resulted from ground-breaking research conducted by neurologists in government hospitals affiliated with the Weizmann Institute. Thus the state owns the rights to the study.
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The state learned of the scandal in 2018 when the researchers filed a personal case against Teva.
The new form of Copaxone was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and sold for estimated billions of dollars. Teva filed the patent for the longer interval dose of the multiple sclerosis therapy globally.
The state attorneys claim that Teva violated and stole the state’s intellectual property rights in developing and marketing the new version of Copaxone and failed to pay millions of shekels in royalties.
According to Teva lawsuit is recycled with groundless allegations that were claimed against Teva in the past in a lawsuit that has been pending since 2018. “Teva will respond to the body of the allegations as part of the legal proceedings, as is customary,” the company says.
The state is represented by Advisers Osnat Dafna and Inbal Tuaf of the Civil Enforcement Unit in the State Attorney’s Office and Advisers Liad Whatstein and Amira Mangelus.
