Tribunal reverses CMA’s £35m fine against four anti-nausea pharmaceutical firms

Four pharmaceutical companies have successfully appealed and reversed a £35m fine imposed by the competition regulator over anti-nausea tablets.

Back in 2022, the Competition Market Authority (CMA) fined Alliance Pharmaceuticals, Focus (now owned by Advanz, previously owned by firm Cinven) and Lexon £35m over an “illegal arrangement in the supply of important NHS prescription anti-nausea tablets”.

The medicine in question is known as prochlorperazine, to which the CMA found that the price rose from £6.49 (pack of 50 tablets) in 2013 to £51.68 in 2017, which was a 700 per cent increase.

The pharmaceuticals companies went on to file separate appeals against this decision to the Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT), which listed all of the appeals to be merged and heard as one case.

The appeal went in front of Lord Ericht, Eamonn Doran and David Ulph last year.

In addition, the CMA brought proceedings in the High Court seeking disqualification orders against each of Pritesh Sonpal, Peter Butterfield, John Dawson, Mark Cresswell, Roland Brown, Graeme Duncan and Debangshu Dey on the basis that the market exclusion agreement existed and was in breach of competition law.

The High Court remitted this to the Tribunal on the question of whether the first condition under section 9A of the Company Directors Disqualification Act 1986 has been satisfied in relation to each of these directors.

Last Thursday, the Tribunal handed down its decision in which it ruled that there was no market exclusion agreement – adding that there was no breach of competition law.

The Tribunal ruled that the appeals on behalf of all of the pharmaceutical companies succeeded as the Tribunal found there was no breach of competition law.

As the pharma companies also appeal against penalty, the Tribunal ordered that the issue of penalty does not arise.

On top of that, on each of the directors in question, it decided that the first condition of the Disqualification Act has not been satisfied.

A CMA spokesperson told City A.M.: “We note the judgment from the Tribunal. We will carefully consider our next steps, including whether or not to appeal.”