Colombia v Novartis: Do Big Prices Mean More Compulsory Licensing?

Companies might have to think about how they will deal with increasing pressure on intellectual property rights if the prices of important medicines, for example for cancer and hepatitis C, continue to grow. Colombia now says it will fix the price of Novartis AG' Glivec (imatinib) after its health ministry said that talks with the company had yielded no fruit. However, the specter of a compulsory license still looms in the background and the events could signal that struggling middle-income countries will increasingly up the pressure on companies through tools like compulsory licenses.

Colombia has not traditionally been a priority for companies entering Latin America, but it is an increasingly important market that...