Life Sciences - International

For domestic companies, the life sciences industry is extraordinarily complex and highly regulated. When industry participants seek to penetrate foreign markets or negotiate business relationships with customers and providers in other countries, the challenges they face are increased exponentially.

The life sciences team at McGuireWoods includes numerous lawyers with significant experience assisting developers, manufacturers and distributors of pharmaceuticals, medical devices and other life sciences products in cross-border transactions, regulatory compliance, and other key areas of law and commerce. From our offices in commercial, financial and technology centers across the United States and in London and Brussels, we help clients make the leap into new markets worldwide. We counsel companies in virtually every cross-border legal and business issue that touches the global life sciences industry.

We have an international reputation for our mergers and acquisition counsel, representing buyers and sellers in acquisitions, divestitures, strategic partnerships and joint ventures of all sizes and in numerous countries. In addition to our work on behalf of Fortune 500 clients, we have significant experience in a variety of M&A transactions — whether structured as asset or stock deals — that involve smaller and privately held life sciences enterprises. Furthermore, our depth of experience in public offerings and middle market mergers and acquisitions adds value to growth and technology companies when exploring liquidity events.

Our skilled intellectual property team helps clients identify, protect and maximize the value of their creative assets. We regularly advise clients on trademark, trade dress, copyright, patent registration and protection, and licensing agreements, domestically and internationally, and our skilled IP litigators pursue misappropriation of trade secrets, counterfeiting, diversion and theft, and vigorously defend against such allegations.

Our regulatory work encompasses the full range of new-product trials as well as FDA and European agency notification and approval requirements, sales and marketing regulation, government investigations and defense, healthcare compliance, pricing programs, reimbursement and issues involving third-party payors. Our tax and employee benefits teams provide counsel on executive employment contracts, stock-based and other incentive compensation plans, strategic partnership agreements and consulting agreements, and state and local taxation and tax controversies.

When disputes arise, our life sciences litigation team represents clients in state, federal and international courts and in arbitration and mediation. Whether defending product liability class actions or litigating individual employment matters, our lawyers draw on their in-depth knowledge of the industry to provide cost-effective dispute resolution services that achieve clients’ objectives.