Gilead to Pay Merck $200M in Patent Case

A federal jury ruled that Gilead Sciences must dole out $200 million in damages to Merck and Ionis Pharmaceuticals for patent infringement over the active ingredient sofosbuvir in Gilead’s blockbuster hepatitis C drugs.

Merck — which only recently commercialized its own hepatitis C drug Zepatier in 2016 — will continue to seek royalties going forward on licensing rights for use of the patent in a separate case. The $200 million in damages, which was awarded by a jury in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, covers infringement through Dec. 31, 2015.

The ruling was announced March 24 by Merck and followed a decision on March 22 by the same jury that said Sovaldi and Harvoni infringed patents for compounds and methods used to develop medicines based on the nucleotide analog sofosbuvir.