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The firm won a summary judgment motion on behalf of its client Daiichi Sankyo Co., Ltd., a Tokyo-based pharmaceutical company.  The ruling is significant because it involved Daiichi Sankyo's blockbuster anti-infective drug levofloxacin (sold in the US as Levaquin).  Chief Judge Garrett Brown of the District of New Jersey granted summary judgment in favor of Daiichi Sankyo (the holder of the patent for levofloxacin) and Ortho-McNeil Pharmaceutical, Inc. (Daiichi Sankyo's US licensee) against Lupin Pharmaceutical, Inc.  Lupin, an India-based generic company, had challenged the patent term extension that had been granted by the US Patent and Trademark Office for the levofloxacin patent (5,053,407), arguing that because levofloxacin is an enantiomer, and its racemate (ofloxacin, sold in the US as Floxin) had been previously marketed, the levofloxacin patent was not eligible for patent extension.  Judge Brown disagreed, and granted plaintiffs' motion for summary judgment and denied Lupin's cross motion for summary judgment. With the extension, the patent will not expire until 2011.  The firm continues to represent Daiichi Sankyo in litigation relating to levofloxacin in Canada, the UK, Spain, Italy, Germany, and Greece. 

The STB lawyers on the matter were Hank Gutman, Bob Bourque, Noah Leibowitz, Alex Key, and Scott Sukenick.