Life sciences

“Manches provides EUSA Pharma with a first class service.” Zoe Evans, General Counsel & Company Secretary, EUSA Pharma

Experience

• Acting for the UK affiliate of a multi-national pharmaceutical company in the re-negotiation of a contract with a CMO for the manufacture of approximately 70 marketed products. This work included attending a number of negotiation meetings, drafting amendments to the agreement and liaising with various departments within the client company including quality, commercial, finance and legal.
   
• Representing a quoted pharmaceutical company in a multi-million dollar arbitration claim against its development partner, a multinational pharmaceutical company entrusted with the development and marketing of a promising new antibiotic. The claim, which went to a two-week international arbitration hearing, was for breach of the licence and development agreement after the development partner failed to obtain approval for the licensed drug in the US or EU after its Phase III trials were rejected on data integrity grounds. The case was handled in an extremely tight timescale after the clients transferred to Manches from other lawyers part-way through the proceedings. Details of the arbitration are confidential.
   
• Advising this Swiss quoted pharmaceutical company on the terms of a licence, co-development and co-promotion agreement with a Japanese pharmaceutical company relating to our client’s phase III anti-fungal product for the treatment of life-threatening invasive fungal infections. Under the terms of the agreement, our client received an upfront payment of £48m and is eligible to receive up to £309m in additional payments on achievement of certain milestones as well as double digit, tiered royalties on sales. The licensee will take the lead on development and will contribute most of the remaining investment required for development. Our client retained the right to co-promote the product in key territories.
   
• Our cutting edge technology client had an underperforming employee who fell out with her manager in a crucial sales team, then disclosed she had a serious illness and raised numerous grievances. As a result of a carefully planned and executed capability process the employee resigned without complaint. We were centrally involved in identifying the issues, setting the strategy for dealing with those issues, preparing briefings for meetings and assisting the Directors involved throughout.
   
•  Advising UK based licensors of cell lines in relation to a potential dispute with a major West Coast biotech company over the interpretation of royalty provisions in a licence for the manufacture and use of monoclonal antibodies that form the basis of a new blockbuster psoriasis drug. The dispute related to the interpretation of a royalty stacking provision in the licence. Several millions of dollars of royalties were at stake. The potential dispute was settled by amendment of the licence agreement on a satisfactory basis to all concerned, without the issue of proceedings.