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Consumers Who Bought Certain Generic Prescription Drugs in the United States Between May 2009 and December 2019 Could Be Eligible for Compensation
BALTIMORE, MD – Attorney General Anthony G. Brown today joined a coalition of 43 states and territories seeking court approval of a $400 million settlement with Sandoz Inc. and Fougera Pharmaceuticals Inc. to resolve allegations that the generic drug manufacturers engaged in a widespread, long-running conspiracy to artificially inflate and manipulate prices, reduce competition, and unreasonably restrain trade regarding numerous generic prescription drugs. The states previously announced a settlement in principle on August 3, 2026. All 43 states and territories have since signed on to the agreement, and a motion for preliminary approval of the settlement will be filed today in the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut in Hartford.
Under the terms of this agreement and previous settlements Sandoz reached with other states, Sandoz will pay a total of approximately $469 million to settle the claims brought by state enforcers. The settlement will also resolve allegations that Sandoz Inc.’s past and present international affiliates, Novartis AG, Sandoz AG, and Sandoz Group AG, participated in the alleged anticompetitive conduct and fraudulently transferred assets in order to avoid liability. As part of the settlement, Sandoz has agreed to meaningful injunctive terms including a series of internal reforms to ensure fair competition and compliance with antitrust laws. Maryland’s share of the settlement is more than $6.9 million.
This latest settlement comes as the states prepare for the first trial to be held in Hartford, Connecticut, in February 2027.
“When drug companies conspire to raise prices, Marylanders pay more for the medications they need,” said Attorney General Brown. “This settlement puts money back in the pockets of those who overpaid for medication and holds accountable those who put profits before people’s health.”
The Sandoz settlement follows settlements with Glenmark, Lannett, Bausch, Apotex, and Heritage, as well as Heritage’s parent company, Emcure, totaling $96.5 million.
If you purchased certain generic prescription drugs between May 2009 and December 2019, you may be eligible for compensation. To determine your eligibility, call 1-866-290-0182 (toll-free), email [email protected], or visit www.AGGenericDrugs.com. You can submit a claim for compensation here.
Maryland is part of a coalition of nearly all states and territories engaged in a series of antitrust cases, beginning in 2016. The first complaint included Heritage and 17 other corporate defendants, two individual defendants, and 15 generic drugs. Two former executives from Heritage Pharmaceuticals, Jeffrey Glazer and Jason Malek, have since entered into settlement agreements and are cooperating. The second complaint was filed in 2019 against Teva Pharmaceuticals and 21 of the nation’s largest generic drug manufacturers. The complaint names 16 individual senior executive defendants. The third complaint, to be tried first, focuses on 80 topical generic drugs that account for billions of dollars of sales in the United States and names 26 corporate defendants and 10 individual defendants. The states filed a fourth complaint earlier this year, alleging that Novartis AG, Sandoz Group AG and Sandoz AG, are liable for Sandoz’s alleged conduct and for fraudulently transferring assets.
The cases all stem from a series of investigations built on evidence from several cooperating witnesses at the core of the different conspiracies, a massive document database of over 20 million documents, and a phone records database containing millions of call detail records and contact information for over 600 sales and pricing individuals in the generics industry. Each complaint addresses a different set of drugs and defendants and lays out an interconnected web of competing industry executives who met with each other during industry dinners, “girls nights out,” lunches, cocktail parties, golf outings and communicated via frequent telephone calls, emails and text messages that sowed the seeds for their unlawful agreements. Throughout the complaints, defendants use terms like “fair share,” “playing nice in the sandbox,” and “responsible competitor” to describe how they unlawfully discouraged competition, raised prices and enforced an ingrained culture of collusion. Among the records obtained by the states is a two-volume notebook containing the contemporaneous notes of one of the states’ cooperators that memorialized his discussions during phone calls with competitors and internal company meetings over a period of several years.
Joining Attorney General Brown in the settlement with Sandoz are Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Northern Mariana Islands, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Tennessee, U.S. Virgin Islands, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.
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