Glenmark pays $25 million fine for generic price-fixing

The US subsidiary of Indian drugmaker Glenmark Pharmaceuticals (BSE: 532296) has agreed to pay $25 million, based on its ability to pay, to resolve its alleged liability under the False Claims Act for conspiring to fix the price of a generic drug, the US Department of Justice announced.

The government alleged that, between 2013 and 2015, Glenmark paid and received compensation prohibited by the Anti-Kickback Statute through arrangements on price, supply and allocation of customers with other pharmaceutical manufacturers for a generic drug manufactured by Glenmark, pravastatin, which is widely used to treat high cholesterol and triglyceride levels.

“Illegal collaboration on the price or supply of drugs increases costs both to federal health care programs and beneficiaries,” said Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brian Boynton, head of the Justice Department’s Civil Division. “The department will use every tool at its disposal to prevent such conduct and to protect these taxpayer-funded programs from abuse,” he added.