First up this week are Jay Lefkowitz, Devora Allon and Alexandra Russell of Kirkland & Ellis who scored a knockout win for Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. in a more than decadelong multidistrict litigation where the company was accused of conspiring with Pfizer to delay the launch of a generic version of the blockbuster cholesterol drug Lipitor. U.S. District Judge Peter Sheridan in New Jersey last week granted their motion for summary judgment finding there was no genuine issue of material fact about whether the U.S. Food and Drug Administration would have approved Sun Pharma affiliate’s generic version of Lipitor earlier than Nov. 30, 2011, if not for an earlier settlement between the two companies. The judge also denied class certification to proposed classes of direct purchasers and end-payers. Lefkowitz argued the summary judgment motion, Russell argued against the direct purchasers’ class certification motion, and Allon argued in opposition to the end payers. The Kirkland team also included partners Kyla Jackson, George Hicks and Megan McGlynn, and associates Kris Morton, Chris Fernandez and Amanda Lamothe-Cadet.
A Boies Schiller Flexner team led by Samuel Kaplan and Hamish Hume revived a protest filed by artificial intelligence client Percipient.ai Inc. challenging a government contract decision by the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. The NGA awarded its entire Structured Observation Management, Automation, Augmentation and Artificial Intelligence Framework for Integrated Reporting and Exploitation, or SAFFIRE, contract to CACI Inc.-Federal in 2021. Percipient, which didn’t bid on the contract, claimed the government failed to follow statutory guidelines when CACI didn’t include its commercially available computer vision system in the SAFFIRE procurement. In a ruling industry watchers called “a major decision addressing bid protest jurisdiction and standing at the Court of Federal Claims,” the Federal Circuit last week reversed the lower court’s decision dismissing the case on jurisdictional grounds, and remanded it for further proceedings.
