In re Niaspan Antitrust Litigation

MEMORANDUM

DuBOIS, J.

I. INTRODUCTION

This multidistrict litigation concerns what has come to be known as a “pay-for-delay,” or “reverse payment,” settlement— *740a practice in which a brand-name drug manufacturer brings a patent-infringement action against a generic-drug manufacturer and then compensates the generic-drug manufacturer for its agreement to refrain from entering the market with a competing generic version of the brand-name drug until a specified date. The term “reverse payment” derives from the fact that the payment flows in the direction opposite to what one would normally expect in…