SE - AstraZeneca v. Krka (esomeprazole)

AstraZeneca AB v. Krka Sverige AB, District Court of Stockholm, 4 February 2011, Docket No. T 16565-10

AstraZeneca raised a patent infringement claim against Krka's product Esomeprazol Krka and requested an injunction and damages as well as a search order for further evidence of the alleged infringement in October 2011. The circumstances are that Krka was granted a marketing authorisation for its product (manufactured in Slovenia) on 27 August 2010.  Krka had thereafter also been included in the Swedish pharmaceutical benefits scheme granted price and was intending to sell the product in Sweden. According to AstraZeneca, Krka's product was manufactured with a method in breach of AstraZeneca's EP patent in Sweden.

In pre-litigation correspondence, Krka had informed AstraZeneca that it was intending to start selling its product in Sweden within short (which also would require importing the products). However, Krka claimed that it was manufacturing its product with a method not in breach of the patent. The reason for AstraZeneca's request for a search order was to collect more evidence on the manufacturing method used by Krka so as to be able to show patent infringement. The evidence presented by AstraZeneca at that time was experiments conducted on Krka's product.