UPDATE Court Rejects Antitrust Lawsuits Against Biovail (DJ)

By Brent Kendall Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- A federal appeals court Friday rejected four antitrust class-action lawsuits alleging that pharmaceutical company Biovail Corp. (BVF) engaged in sham patent litigation that delayed the introduction of a generic-drug equivalent to Tiazac, a Biovail drug that treats hypertension. The plaintiffs, wholesale drug purchasers, had argued that Biovail's patent litigation tactics illegally impeded generic manufacturer Andrx Pharmaceuticals Inc. from obtaining government approval for a generic version of Tiazac. The wholesale purchasers said without Biovail's interference, Andrx could have received Food and Drug Administration approval to market a generic form of Tiazac two years earlier than it did. Rejecting those claims, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of... [read full story]