According to Zhitong Finance APP, the American pharmaceutical giant Bristol-Myers Squibb Company (BMY.US) encountered a lawsuit worth up to 6.7 billion USD on Thursday, accusing it of deceiving former Celgene shareholders by delaying federal approval for three pharmaceutical products. Just a month and a half before this new lawsuit, a federal judge in the USA unexpectedly dismissed an earlier version of the case.

It is reported that the lawsuit alleges that Bristol-Myers Squibb intentionally delayed the approval process for drug applications, including its blockbuster cancer drug Breyanzi, resulting in additional losses of 9 USD per share for holders of the contingent value rights (CVR). The lawsuit claims that Bristol-Myers Squibb did this to avoid significant capital expenditures, even suggesting that the move was aimed at avoiding payments of an additional 9 USD per share to CVR holders.

In 2021, UMB Bank filed a lawsuit against Bristol-Myers Squibb on behalf of CVR holders, claiming that Bristol-Myers Squibb "deliberately slowed down" the approval process for Breyanzi, particularly failing to timely provide relevant documents for review on December 29, 2020. Ultimately, Breyanzi received FDA approval in February 2021, but had missed the CVR agreement's deadline.

Previously, on September 30, a federal judge in Manhattan, Jesse Furman, ruled that the plaintiff UMB Bank had never been formally appointed as a trustee to represent the holders of CVR.

He stated that this "inexplicable failure" doomed the early lawsuit filed by UMB after it changed to another trustee to fail, at which point 17 months had passed since Bristol-Myers Squibb's cumulative acquisition of Celgene Company at a total value of up to 80.3 billion USD. Furthermore, the court indicated that there was no evidence showing that Bristol-Myers Squibb intentionally delayed or engaged in fraudulent behavior.

In Thursday's complaint, UMB stated that it had resolved the judge's concerns and had been recognized as the trustee, thus entitled to file a lawsuit. The latest lawsuit shows that Bristol-Myers Squibb's estimated liability is 6.7 billion USD, higher than the 6.4 billion USD mentioned in earlier court documents.

Bristol-Myers Squibb and its lawyers did not immediately respond to media interview requests after the market trading hours. UMB's legal team also did not immediately respond to another interview request.

It is reported that on February 5, 2021, Bristol-Myers Squibb's Breyanzi received formal approval from the usa Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the treatment of non-Hodgkin lymphoma, which was five weeks past the relevant deadline for CVR holders.

The case is UMB Bank NA vs. Bristol-Myers Squibb, located in the usa Southern District Court of New York, case number 24-08668.

On November 21, 2019, usa pharmaceutical giant Bristol-Myers Squibb announced that it had obtained all regulatory approvals necessary for the acquisition agreement of Celgene, and had received approval from both shareholders on April 12, 2019, which means that Bristol-Myers Squibb successfully completed the acquisition of Celgene. After the acquisition, Celgene became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Bristol-Myers Squibb, and after integrating Celgene, Bristol-Myers Squibb undoubtedly has a stronger product line and research and development capabilities in the fields of oncology, hematology, immunology, and cardiovascular disease.

Bristol-Myers Squibb officially completed the large-scale acquisition of Celgene, one of the largest merger and acquisition projects in the history of the global pharmaceutical industry. According to the agreement, Celgene shareholders can receive one share of Bristol-Myers Squibb stock, 50 dollars in cash, and a tradable or valuable right (CVR) for each share of Celgene stocks held, and if future regulatory milestones are met, CVR holders can receive an additional 9 dollars in cash.