Pharmaceutical companies depend on the patent protection they receive for their goods, so it's never a good day when it is stripped away. That was the misfortune suffered by global pharmaceutical company (NYSE: NVS) on Friday. Following a judge's invalidation of one of its better-selling drugs, the company's share price took a more than 3% hit. That was notably worse than the 0.3% slip of the S 500 index on the day.

The latest decision in a long-running patent dispute over Novartis' heart drug Entresto was unfavorable to the company. Delaware District Court Judge Richard Andrews ruled that a Novartis patent covering the medication, plus combinations of sacubitril and valsartan, was invalid due to what he termed "lack of written description."

Novartis has spent years defending its Entresto patent. In 2019, it brought a lawsuit against a clutch of peers on the basis that generic versions being developed constituted infringement.

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Source Fool.com