Novartis and Amgen, who have been at odds for years over a deal gone sour, have agreed to put down their weapons and move on.
The two companies have been in a legal battle since 2019, when Novartis sued Amgen, accusing Amgen of backing out of development agreements for the migraine drug Aimovig. Amgen responded quickly filing its own suit against Novartis, saying the Swiss pharma giant broke their deal by helping bring a potential competitor drug, by Alder BioPharmaceuticals, to market. In a recent SEC filing, Amgen said the parties were updating the terms of their Aimovig collaboration and settling their dueling lawsuits related to the deal.
Aimovig is a monoclonal antibody that blocks activation of a migraine causing protein, called calcitonin gene-related peptide (CGRP). It was approved by the U.S. FDA in May 2018 for the prevention of migraine in adults and is administered via a monthly self-injection. At the time of approval, Aimovig was the first CGRP migraine prevention treatment authorized by the FDA.
Since Aimovig’s approval in 2018, several other drugs have been approved for prevention of migraine including Eli Lilly’s Emgality, Teva’s Ajovy and Lundbeck’s Vyepti.
Moving forward, Amgen will no longer pay royalties to Novartis on U.S. sales of the drug but will pay for the cost of commercializing the drug in the U.S. Novartis will have rights to commercialize Aimovig outside of the U.S. and Japan. The two companies will share development expenses worldwide.