European Union regulators have raided several pharmaceutical companies on suspicion the companies may have breached EU antitrust rules, a European Commission spokesman said this afternoon.
"I can confirm that the Commission started surprise inspections at several pharmaceutical companies on October 6th," spokesman Jonathan Todd said.
He said the Commission, the EU watchdog, had reason to believe the companies may have infringed EU competition rules that prohibit restrictive business practices and abuse of a dominant market position.
He declined to provide details of the companies. France's Sanofi-Aventis confirmed that it had been raided and that it was collaborating with EU antitrust regulators.
An industry source said three other drugmakers were believed to have been inspected.
British drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline and AstraZeneca said they were not aware of any raids on their sites. Merck KGaA and Bayer said they were not raided.
Reuters