Sandoz settles US drug price claims for $478.5m

Swiss pharmaceutical group Sandoz said Monday it had reached two settlements in the United States worth a total of $478.5 million to resolve long-running generic drug pricing disputes.

Sandoz and its subsidiary Fougera Pharmaceuticals agreed with a consortium representing 43 US states and territories to pay $400 million over seven years, starting in 2027. Sandoz said the agreement would release claims asserted against the company and its affiliates.

The Basel-based generic and biosimilar drug maker said the settlement required an additional payment of about $50 million to states that had settled earlier, bringing total state-related payments to about $450 million.

Sandoz also reached a $28.5 million settlement with indirect resellers, including pharmacies, clinics, hospitals and other entities that resold medicines to consumers.

The company said both agreements contained no admission of wrongdoing. It said the only remaining US generic antitrust claims against it were from individual plaintiffs who opted out of class settlements.

Zurich Cantonal Bank analysts said the settlement brought clarity to a legal dispute that Sandoz had disclosed as a risk in annual reports since 2016.

Sandoz said the settlements would not affect its 2026 or medium-term financial forecasts because provisions had already been set aside.

Several generic drug manufacturers were targeted from 2016 by a US Department of Justice investigation into suspected price-fixing. In 2020, Sandoz reached an agreement with the Justice Department in exchange for a $195 million penalty. Sandoz was later spun off by Novartis in 2023.