Indivior Inc To Pay $10 Million After Settling FTC Charges It Used Anticompetitive Tactics To Impede Competition From Lower-Cost Suboxone Generics
This week, Indivior Inc. agreed to pay $10 million to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that it had violated antitrust laws through a deceptive scheme to stop lower-priced generic competition with its opioid replacement therapy drug Suboxone. The purposed stipulated order bars Indivior from engaging in similar behavior in the future.
Suboxone is used to minimize the withdrawal symptoms associated with opioid addiction. The settlement comes after the FTC reached a settlement with Indivior’s former parent company Reckitt Benckiser Group plc in 2019.
The $10 million will be combined with the $50 million from the Reckitt Benckiser Group settlement. That money will be added to a fund that will be used to pay individuals who purchased Suboxone Oral Film. Anyone who was prescribed Suboxone film in the United States from March 1, 2013 to February 28, 2019 can file a claim online by visiting www.ftc.gov/suboxone.
In 2009, Indivior’s regulatory exclusivity for Suboxone was set to expire and the company would soon face competition from lower-cost generics. The complaint alleges that Suboxone took steps to thwart these lower-cost alternatives. It was accused of developing a dissolvable oral film version of Suboxone and shifting prescriptions to this version of the drug.
Furthermore, the company filed a meritless citizen petition with the FDA requesting the agency reject any generic tablet application. Further details can be found here.
