On 20 May, the US District Court for the Central District of California affirmed a seven-figure jury verdict and granted a permanent injunction in a rare Robinson-Patman Act decision. The RPA is an antitrust statute that prohibits certain kinds of price discrimination in goods purchased for resale. The case, LA International Corp. v. Prestige Brands Holdings, was pursued by a group of local wholesaler plaintiffs that claimed a defendant eye drop manufacturer and its subsidiaries sold the plaintiffs eye drops on less favorable terms than the defendant’s club store wholesale customer.

On 27 June 2023, the Federal Trade Commission, with the concurrence of the Assistant Attorney General for the US Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division, announced proposed changes to the premerger notification form and associated instructions and rules that implement the Hart-Scott-Rodino (HSR) Act. The proposed changes represent an expansion and reorganization of the information collected on the HSR form.

Over the past few months, the Federal Trade Commission has engaged in a comprehensive review of how the agency should evaluate antitrust issues affecting the pharmaceutical distribution stack.