{"id":6018,"date":"2019-02-04T14:45:16","date_gmt":"2019-02-04T18:45:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ncjolt.org\/?p=6018"},"modified":"2020-06-04T20:52:28","modified_gmt":"2020-06-04T20:52:28","slug":"the-filler-affect-one-lines-monopoly-on-pain-alleviation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/blogs\/the-filler-affect-one-lines-monopoly-on-pain-alleviation\/","title":{"rendered":"The Filler Effect: One Line\u2019s Monopoly on Pain Alleviation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Despite a lagged government at the beginning of the new year, IP related claims from a variety of all industries and places are already piling up.\u00a0 Summarized by IPWatchDog\u2019s \u201cOther Barks & Bite<\/em>s\u201d<\/a> column, among the notable are China\u2019s Beijing intellectual property courts that have created new formal requirements, the European Parliament members canceled meeting regarding copyright reforms, and the European Union recently revoking McDonald\u2019s trademark registration for big mac. Back home in the States, Rihanna<\/a> has filed a Trademark suit against her Father\u2019s Entertainment company, Ed Sheeran<\/a> has asked the Southern District of New York Judge to reconsider his copyright case for \u201cThinking out Loud,\u201d and the Georgia GOP<\/a> has sued over the use of Stacey Abrams Photo in the Governor\u2019s campaign ad. <\/p>\n\n\n

…it is likely that the court will permanently enjoin Prollenium within the United States…<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n

Topping off the past week, I want to highlight \u201cThe Filler Effect.\u201d In a petition filed by Allergan against a smaller Canadian rival, Prollenium Medical Technologies Inc., Allergen asserts that its competitor has infringed on two Juv\u00e9derm patents as part of Prollenium\u2019s Revanesse Versa+ filler formulation<\/a>. In the complaint under Docket No. 1:19-cv-00126 (D. Del. Jan 22, 2019), Allergan\u2019s \u201cHyaluronic Acid-Based Gels Including Lidocaine\u201d patent has helped alleviate the pain associated with the hyaluronic gel injections to the face. Lidocaine as a local anesthetic is thereby desirable for its pain reducing affect. The petition also alleges that although prior hyaluronic acid-based compositions have been attempted to include lidocaine during the manufacturing process, none were successful because they degraded at least in part upon injection. This patent represents the formulations for and methods of manufacturing, which Allergan made sure to emphasize. \u00a0They acknowledged a suit against them back in 2017, Teoxane S.A. v. <\/em>Allergan, Docket No. IPR2017-01906 (P.T.A.B. Aug. 02, 2017). There, Teoxane <\/em>alleged that<\/a> an injectable soft tissue filler including lidocaine and hyaluronic acid would have been obvious to a person of the ordinary skill in the art. \u201cHA-based soft tissue fillers were known and under rapid development since the FDA [U.S. Food and Drug Administration] approved the first HA-based soft tissue filler in December, 2003,\u201d the petition states.\u00a0<\/a> \u201cIn particular, crosslinked HA compositions\/fillers had been used due to increased stability and durability.\u00a0 . . . Lidocaine had been included in various dermal fillers to reduce pain upon injection, a major barrier to cosmetic treatments.\u201d Other research<\/a> tends to compliment these assertions being that many filler products contain lidocaine. However, the unique method and formula that Allergan asserts its patent over caused the P.T.A.B. to deny Teoxane\u2019s petition. They ruled that Teoxane had not shown a reasonable likelihood of prevailing at trial with respect to any challenge of Allergan\u2019s Juv\u00e9derm patent. Allergan is clearly a leader in the distribution of dermal filler. With one syringe of Juv\u00e9derm Voluma running between $700 to $1200<\/a> in major cities, and treatments varying from one to four syringes it\u2019s no wonder that this line has topped $500 million of sales per year in the United States. Not to forget that Allegan has been effective in protecting its patent against market entrants. Therefore, it is likely that the court will permanently enjoin Prollenium within the United States from selling its Revanesse Versa+ filler formulation along with the damages Allergan seeks.<\/p>\n\n\n

Katie Donald, 28 January 2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Despite a lagged government at the beginning of the new year, IP related claims from a variety of all industries and places are already piling up.\u00a0 Summarized by IPWatchDog\u2019s \u201cOther Barks & Bites\u201d column, among the notable are China\u2019s Beijing intellectual property courts that have created new formal requirements, the European Parliament members canceled meeting …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6019,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[51],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6018"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6018"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6018\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6869,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6018\/revisions\/6869"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6019"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6018"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6018"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6018"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}