Abstract
This article analyzes Allergan, Inc. v. Revance Therapeutics, Inc., 711 F. Supp. 3d 873 (M.D. Tenn. 2024), a decision enhancing trade secret protection on biological product innovations. Here, the district court determined that the complaint plausibly alleged the defendant’s unauthorized use of some of the plaintiff’s trade secrets. This holding relied on comparison between the alleged trade secrets and the development or testing of the defendant’s biological drugs. The Allergan approach extends the Sixth Circuit’s Stratienko rule that compares the plaintiff’s trade secret(s) and the defendant’s product as a way to prove unauthorized use of the plaintiff’s trade secret(s). Under the Allergan approach, the trade secret protection of pioneer biologics expands its peripheral boundary to cover the pioneer company’s proprietary information of stability and potency testing of its pioneer biological. In addition, the Allergan decision will provide advanced protection on the pioneer company’s trade secrets before the biosimilar company starts to file a biosimilar application.
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