sales of Viagra, is subject to appeal.
| Dosage Form | Strengths (mg) | Available Packaging | Typical Use Cases |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tablets | 25 | Blister packs of 4, 8 | Mild to moderate ED |
| Tablets | 50 | Blister packs of 4, 8 | Common dose, initial use |
| Tablets | 100 | Blister packs of 4, 8 | Severe ED issues |
The decision came as a surprise to analysts, most of whom had expected Viagra to lose market exclusivity in 2012. Pfizer's shares rose 2 percent to $18.23 in mid-morning trading on the New York Stock Exchange. The ruling comes as Pfizer braces for the loss later this year of market exclusivity for its biggest-selling product, the cholesterol-lowering drug Lipitor, which had 2010 sales of nearly $11 billion.
Despite discovering the method for the mass production of penicillin, it was Viagra that made Pfizer’s corporate brand famous. But all good things come to an end. The European patent that has protected Viagra from copy-cat generic companies for more than a decade expired on Friday. It’s the kind of nightmare that would keep most marketers up all night. Imagine losing your ability to protect your product formula, brand equity, most of your key accounts and your pricing strategy overnight.
That is what it means to lose patent protection. Viagra will still be marketed by Pfizer in the UK and across Europe. But it will now face competition from more than 20 different generic manufacturers which will flood the market with identical versions of Sildenafil Citrate. The extra competition combined with the lower research and development costs of these generic players means that, aside from suddenly facing multiple competitors, the average price for treatment will drop from around £10 per pill to less than £1 within weeks. Like all good big pharma organisations, Pfizer has been expecting and planning for the loss of patent protection for several years. "I think this is an important win for Pfizer," said Damien Conover, an analyst at Morningstar. "If you can hold on to $1 billion in sales of a high-margin product, that will definitely help offset the patent cliff Pfizer is facing." A spokeswoman for Teva declined to comment on the ruling.
| Product | Dosage | Quantity + Bonus | Price | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Viagra Generic | 25mg | 90 + 6 Pills | 105.03€ 100.03€ | |
| Viagra Professional | 100mg | 60 + 2 Pills | 146.74€ 139.75€ | |
| Viagra Generic | 100mg | 120 + 6 Pills | 149.50€ 142.38€ | |
| Viagra Professional | 100mg | 180 + 4 Pills | 337.30€ 321.24€ | |
| Viagra Original | 100mg | 92 + 4 Pills | 362.88€ 345.60€ | |
| Viagra Generic | 50mg | 30 + 4 Pills | 54.26€ 51.68€ | |
| Viagra Super Active | 100mg | 360 + 30 Pills | 470.93€ 448.50€ | |
| Viagra Super Active | 100mg | 10 Pills | 28.76€ 27.39€ | |
| Viagra Generic | 50mg | 20 Pills | 40.52€ 38.59€ | |
| Viagra Soft Tabs | 100mg | 10 Pills | 36.93€ 35.17€ |
Analysts at Jefferies & Company estimate that the retention of U.S. Viagra sales is worth 3 percent to 4 percent in additional earnings per share. Viagra generated nearly $2 billion in worldwide sales in 2010, of which roughly half came from the United States.
It will attempt to keep Viagra in the market, albeit at a lower price, and encourage patients to continue to request the drug by name thus side-stepping the generic threat. For patients prescribed the drug via the NHS, however, one or more of the generics will replace Viagra on the government tender, saving the UK taxpayer millions of pounds but eliminating one of Viagra’s biggest sources of patients. Pfizer will almost certainly introduce its own generic version of Sildenafil Citrate, codenamed ‘White Diamond’, this week in an attempt to retain market share among the new generic options. Whatever its strategy, the loss of Viagra’s patent protection will be very hard on Pfizer. When the company’s cholesterol treatment, Lipitor, lost its American patent in 2011 revenues declined by an eye-watering £4bn in a single year.
There are only two long-term responses to the challenge of losing patent protection. First, optimise the brand while you have a patent. Unlike FMCG where brands often only reach their zenith 50 years after launch, big pharma marketers know they usually have 25 mg viagra only a 10-year window to make their profits and they act accordingly. Second, make sure your product pipeline is ready with the next big blockbuster. Once the profit potential of an off-patent brand like Viagra begins to diminish, there has to be a new brand with a protectable formula waiting to explode from your pipeline. Pfizer, the world's biggest drugmaker, said litigation on the same patent remains pending against other generic companies, but no trials are scheduled in those cases.
On Aug. 24, Pfizer sent a memo to its employees admitting that a computer security breech has affected approximately 34,000 current employees, former employees, colleagues, and healthcare professionals. "This was done without Pfizer's knowledge or consent, in violation of Pfizer policy," the memo stated. "The individual is no longer employed by the company." According to Wesson, Pfizer is just one of many Fortune 500 pharma companies plagued with this problem. His company outs many of them through its blog.
"Organizations that are having these kinds of infections are having their intellectual properties exfiltrated to foreign countries," Wesson said. "That is the problem here, not that Viagra is being advocated from a compromised computer on Pfizer's network." Others, however, feel that Pfizer is not wholly at fault and that the story might have been sensationalized due to the fact that the spam in question was advertising Pfizer's erectile dysfunction drug. Viagra ads represented only a fraction of the spam sent through the security hole; other ads included those for penis enhancers and highly counterfeited drugs, such as Oxycontin. "This type of problem could happen to any large company with a system like this," said Jay Bolling, president of Roska Healthcare Advertising. "I do think Pfizer is the victim in this case. "Teva is considered the strongest among the generic drugmakers when it comes to litigation, so the fact that Teva lost this doesn't augur well for the smaller competitors that lack the legal resources that Teva has," said Les Funtleyder, a portfolio manager at Miller Tabak & Co, which owns Pfizer shares but not Teva's. Teva had challenged Pfizer's U.S.
But at the same time, the company should acknowledge the problem and rally the public around trying to offset this problem in the future. It should also educate the users of the system." Bolling recommends that companies follow basic Internet maintenance, such as system updates, virus-prevention updates, and log-file reviews, to isolate data that is vulnerable. "A group like Pfizer really has to weigh security access when it has thousands of representatives running around the system, downloading various files, and being able to access things on its servers," Bolling said. "When you have thousands of salespeople on the road with laptops connected to different systems on the company network, anything can happen." Sign in to ask about medicines, check stock and place orders. 📦 How many units of do you want?
50) $event.target.value = 50" placeholder="Enter quantity" class="w-full px-4 !py-3 border-2 border-blue-300 rounded form-control text-gray-900 font-semibold" /> Viagra 100mg is a trusted medication used to treat erectile dysfunction (ED). Each tablet contains 100mg of Sildenafil, a PDE5 inhibitor that enhances blood flow to the penis, helping to achieve and maintain an erection. Effective and fast-acting, Viagra 100mg provides reliable support for men's sexual health. Last week we witnessed a major turning point in the history of modern pharmaceuticals: Viagra came off patent in the UK. For the past 15 years, the impotence drug has generated billions for its manufacturer Pfizer. method-of-treatment patent, which covers the indication for which the drug is used.
The U.S.
composition-of-matter patent is set to expire in March 2012.
In 1990, the company had been testing a new blood pressure drug called Sildenafil Citrate at its research facility in Kent. Although its effects on high blood pressure were disappointing, doctors involved in the patient trials reported a fascinating, if unexpected, side effect. Many of the test patients, who had previously struggled to achieve and maintain erections, were experiencing an unexpected revitalisation in the downstairs department. Further tests confirmed the result and in 1998 Pfizer went to its naming bank, picked the name Viagra and launched the drug with a massive fanfare of publicity. Pfizer knew it had a wonder drug but also that without strong marketing its success would be severely limited by the social stigma of impotence.
So Pfizer created a new condition – erectile dysfunction – to imply that the problem was not the man but the penis, and that the penis could be easily fixed by Viagra. Approximately 10 per cent of the male population suffer from some form of erectile dysfunction; around 750,000 British men took Viagra last year. And because Viagra does not cure the disorder but merely treats it, Viagra’s lifetime value is just as impressive as its potential penetration. Add to that the unpalatable nature of the alternative treatments – either two vigorous hours with a vacuum pump before love making or multiple injections into the head of your penis – and it was clear that Viagra was a wonder drug. Within a year of Viagra’s successful launch Pfizer’s share price had doubled. Typically, it is the composition-of-matter patent that holds off competition.
| Region | Units Sold (Millions) | Revenue (USD Millions) | Market Share (%) |
|---|---|---|---|
| North America | 10 | 1500 | 40 |
| Europe | 8 | 1200 | 32 |
| Asia-Pacific | 6 | 900 | 18 |
| Latin America | 4 | 600 | 10 |
That Pfizer won the "use" patent may have something to do with its unusual development history. Viagra, known also as sildenafil, was originally developed as a blood pressure treatment. Its impact on erectile dysfunction was discovered by accident.
That discovery triggered a new "use" patent, which has enabled the company to hold off competition longer. A lower-dose version of the drug, Revatio, is used to improve the ability to exercise in people with pulmonary arterial hypertension -- or high blood pressure in the vessels carrying blood to the lungs. Reporting by Toni Clarke, editing by Gerald E. McCormick and Gunna Dickson Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles. Sildenafil is commonly used for the following conditions.
The big question keeping Pfizer up at night is not what it will now do about Viagra, but what it has that can possibly replace it. BOSTON (Reuters) - Pfizer Inc said on Monday it won a patent infringement case against the U.S. unit of Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd, preventing Teva from launching a generic version of Pfizer's erectile dysfunction drug Viagra until October 2019. A federal court judge ruled on Friday that the patent under dispute was valid and enforceable. The decision, which affects about $1 billion in U.S. Erectile dysfunction, a condition where you have trouble getting or keeping an erection Pulmonary arterial hypertension, a condition where you have high blood pressure in the blood vessels that carry blood from your heart to your lungs Sildenafil may also be used for other conditions as determined by your healthcare provider.
| Condition | Warning Level | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| Uncontrolled hypertension | High | Risk of severe hypotension |
| Cardiovascular disease | High | Increased cardiac risk |
| Use of nitrate medications | High | Dangerous drop in blood pressure |
| Retinitis pigmentosa | Moderate | Potential retinal complications |