Abbott Told To Pay J&J $1.67 Billion Over Patent

By JONATHAN D. ROCKOFF

A federal jury in Texas Monday upheld the patent on Johnson & Johnson's arthritis treatment Remicade and ordered Abbott Laboratories to pay its rival $1.67 billion for infringing on the patent.

New Brunswick, N.J.-based J&J had alleged that Abbott's rheumatoid arthritis therapy Humira infringed a patent that J&J's Centocor Ortho Biotech unit held for rival treatment Remicade.

The patent is co-owned with New York University.

The two companies have been engaged in patent disputes over the competing therapies and a newer product, which belong to a class called anti-tumor necrosis factor, or anti-TNF, all drugs with billions of dollars in yearly sales.

Kim Taylor, president of Centocor Ortho Biotech, said in a statement that the company was "particularly gratified that the jury recognized our valuable intellectual property, finding our patent both valid and infringed" and will continue asserting its patent rights for its rheumatoid arthritis therapies.

Humira is Abbott's biggest seller, accounting for $4.5 billion in sales, or 15% of the company's revenues last year.

The company, based in Abbott Park, Ill., said it would appeal.

"We are disappointed in this verdict, and we are confident in the merits of our case and that we will prevail on appeal," the company said in a statement.

Abbott will now count on a judge to overturn the jury's award, as a federal judge did in 2007 when voiding one of the previous largest patent verdicts, a $1.52 billion verdict that a jury said Microsoft Corp. should pay Alcatel-Lucent SA for violating digital-music technology patents.

Last year, a federal appeals court upheld the judge's ruling overturning the verdict.

The jury issued its verdict after a week-long trial in U.S. District Court in Marshall, Texas, where many patent infringement lawsuits are filed because of the court's expertise in patent law