Our team delivers strategic counsel and robust advocacy to protect your interests in high-stakes litigation and arbitration, whether that be product liability litigation, consumer or third-party class actions, False Claims Act litigation, contract disputes, payment appeals or disputes, or domestic or international arbitration.
Product liability litigation
We offer a nationally recognized U.S. life sciences product liability team with additional capabilities in Europe and beyond. For more information, please visit our Life Sciences Product Liability page.
False Claims Act litigation
Our highly regarded, nationally ranked False Claims Act investigations and litigation practice focuses on defending life sciences and health care entities in the United States. Whether the government intervenes in a matter, or a relator pursues the matter themselves, Reed Smith can provide substantive, effective advocacy in FCA litigation. For more information, please visit our Health Care and Life Sciences Investigations page.
International arbitration
Our life sciences arbitration lawyers are renowned for their handling of complex disputes and deep understanding of the unique needs of life sciences companies. We provide comprehensive support at every stage, from drafting arbitration clauses and developing dispute avoidance strategies to representing clients before arbitral tribunals and courts in related litigation. Drawing on the experience of our multidisciplinary global life sciences practice, we build teams that deliver holistic advice for arbitrations seated across the United States, Europe, Asia, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America.
Clients trust us with their most significant arbitration disputes, including matters involving product development, commercialization, manufacturing, supply, distribution, collaboration, licensing, regulatory, intellectual property, and post-M&A issues. Our team’s industry knowledge and arbitration skills ensure superior client service and practical, commercial solutions. In addition to acting as counsel, our lawyers routinely sit as arbitrators and play leading roles in major arbitral institutions, further enhancing our ability to resolve disputes efficiently and effectively. For more information, please visit our International Arbitration page.
Consumer and third-party class actions and other group actions
We have defended thousands of putative class actions in state and federal courts across the United States, including many filed by top national plaintiffs’ class action firms. Our focuses include consumer/retail, false advertising, privacy and data security, and unfair competition and consumer protection. We regularly represent leading companies of all sizes in the defense of such litigation, and in connection with the development and execution of litigation and strategic resolution options in some of their largest, most complex class action cases.
We also have significant experience defending third-party payor class actions, including those filed against life sciences companies in product liability litigation and against pharmacies in usual and customary price litigation.
Payment appeals and disputes
In the United States, our team has helped health care providers navigate many of the thorniest issues impacting their relationships with the government, payors, and related third parties, including reimbursement challenges, audits, rebates, and disputes. We have counseled virtually every type of provider on coverage and payment issues and have successfully represented many before federal and state courts and administrative agencies. This includes appealing Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ determinations of noncompliance and of overpayment before the Provider Reimbursement Review Board and appealing Zone Program Integrity Contractor, Unified Program Integrity Contractor, and other contractor audits.
We also represent our clients before courts and arbitration tribunals around the country. For example, we have represented providers in both defending and pursuing claims in arbitrations involving contractual disputes related to provider reimbursement, including those related to pharmaceutical pricing. This work draws from our deep experience with health care-related investigative and enforcement activity, and experience counseling clients on fraud-and-abuse and reimbursement matters.
Additionally, we are supporting pharmaceutical manufacturers both in Medicaid rebate disputes with various states, as well as with administrative dispute resolution claims related to providing 340B prices to contract pharmacies.
Beyond counseling clients on these matters from a legal, contractual, and compliance perspective, we engage on a regular basis with state and federal enforcement agencies – including the Department of Justice, Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General, Department of Veterans Affairs, Department of Defense, state Medicaid Fraud Control Units, and state attorneys general – as well as with litigants filing claims on behalf of the government in the qui tam context.
