Day October 29, 2018

The Cost of Accessing Academic Research Is Way Too High. This Must Change.

[Coauthored with Leti Kleyn]... Globally, the scholarly publishing system is in dire need of financial and legislative change. To address this issue, the Max Planck Digital Library in Munich has produced a White Paper that aims to completely reform the business model of academic journals. The paper proposes that individual countries change the underlying legal and financial structures that challenge the high subscription fees levied by publishers. Could a country like South Africa manage the changes as advocated in the White Paper? Getting new financial models going will be difficult because of the complexity of the industry’s internal workings and a shortage of data on actual expenditure. However, the country is making headway on the legal framework front.

Australian Competition and Consumer Commission v Pfizer: Evergreening and Market Power as a Blockbuster Drug Goes Off Patent

[Thomas Faunce] Abstract: In Australian Competition and Consumer Commission v Pfizer Australia Pty Ltd [2015] FCA 113 the ACCC alleged that Pfizer’s ‘Project LEAP’ involved a scheme to lock pharmacists into substituting its generic version of the high sales volume anti-cholesterol drug patent-expired Atorvastatin (Lipitor) which took advantage of a substantial degree of market power for a purpose proscribed by s 46(1)(c) of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth). The ACCC also claimed that Pfizer’s actions constituted a course of exclusive dealing pursuant to s 47(1)(d) and (e) for the proscribed purpose of lessening competition. Flick J in the Federal Court of Australia in a judgment heavy with quotations but sparse in reasoning, dismissed the ACCC’s Amended Originating Application alleging abuse of market power and ordered the ACCC to pay Pfizer’s costs. This column explores that case in the context of Pfizer’s broader strategies to preserve its income globally from this high sales volume drug.