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Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. agreed to sell assets to GE Healthcare to settle �鶹��ý Trade Commission charges that its proposed $13.6 billion acquisition of Life Technologies Corporation (Life) would likely substantially lessen competition.The FTC complaint alleged that the deal, as it was originally proposed, would have eliminated close competition between Thermo Fisher and Life and substantially increased concentration in the markets for short/small interfering ribonucleic acid (siRNA) reagents, cell culture media, and cell culture sera, enabling the combined firm to raise prices and reduce quality for consumers. The proposed order settling the FTC’s charges requires Thermo Fisher to divest its gene modulation business Dharmacon, which contains the siRNA reagents business, as well as its cell culture media and sera business including the HyClone brand to GE Healthcare, along with all intellectual property and know-how necessary to operate each of the divested businesses.

Pharmaceutical companies Endo Health Sciences Inc. (Endo) and Boca Life Science Holdings, LLC and Boca Pharmacal, LLC (Boca) agreed to a settlement resolving FTC charges that Endo’s acquisition of Boca would be anticompetitive. Under the settlement, the companies will relinquish their rights to market and distribute four generic multivitamin fluoride drops for children, and will sell three other generic drugs in development.The proposed settlement preserves competition in the pharmaceutical markets for four prescription generic multivitamin drop products given to children in the United States who do not have access to fluoridated water.  In addition, the FTC’s settlement preserves future competition for three generic drugs where the proposed acquisition would eliminate one likely future entrant from a very limited pool of future entrants.

Under a settlement with th FTC, Mylan, Inc., and Agila Specialties Global Pte. Ltd and Agila Specialties Pvt. Ltd. (collectively, Agila)  divested 11 generic injectable drugs as a condition of allowing Mylan’s proposed acquisition of Agila from Strides Arcolab Ltd. (Strides). According to the complaint, in each of these 11 markets, Mylan and Agila are two of only a limited number of current or likely future competitors. The number of suppliers in generic pharmaceutical markets matters because prices generally decrease as the number of competing generic suppliers increases. In addition, the injectable generic products of concern are highly susceptible to supply disruptions caused by the inherent difficulties of producing sterile liquid drugs.

Under a settlement, the FTC required Watson Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and Actavis Inc. to sell the rights and assets to 18 drugs to Sandoz International GmbH and Par Pharmaceuticals, Inc, and relinquish the manufacturing and marketing rights to three others, to settle charges that Watson’s proposed $5.9 billion acquisition of Actavis would otherwise be anticompetitive.The settlement protects competition in the markets for 21 current and future generic drugs, used to treat a wide range of conditions ranging from hypertension and diabetes to anxiety and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).