For more than 40 years, our nationally recognized U.S. product liability team has proudly partnered with companies like yours, helping to mitigate risk and protect key products. We focus on quickly and efficiently disposing of claims, favorably resolving them, or aggressively defending you at trial – so you can concentrate on what matters: driving breakthroughs, advancing access to life saving products, and improving lives.
While we are always ready to defend individual cases or serve as local or regional counsel, our national reputation is built on successfully representing branded and generic pharmaceutical, medical device, and consumer health companies in high-profile, complex, and mass tort product liability litigation. Our experience extends to related consumer class actions, third-party payor litigation, and public nuisance claims, as well as toxic tort lawsuits targeting our clients.
We offer:
A record of success at trial
When trial is necessary, we deploy multiple, experienced trial lawyers throughout the United States. Our recent experience has included several full defense or otherwise extremely favorable verdicts, often in some of the most challenging jurisdictions. Our team of trial lawyers structures arguments in ways that are persuasive and easy for juries to comprehend. We frequently manage and try notable cases involving issues at the bet-the-company level, as well as issues of first impression, and those involving emerging technology.
Strong record with mediation and settlement
Clients turn to us as settlement counsel because of our deep experience litigating mass tort claims in federal and state courts, our keen understanding of the litigation life cycle and the pressure points for both parties, and our track record of developing litigation strategies that protect the commercial successes of our clients and the life sciences industry as a whole. As settlement counsel, our team understands the complexities our clients face when hit with hundreds, or thousands, of claims in coordinated proceedings.
Successful dispositive motions practice
We routinely engage in early case assessment and explore potential grounds for dispositive motions, either motions to dismiss the pleadings or motions for summary judgment once evidence has been marshaled. Preemption issues are uniquely suited to early (pre-discovery) dispositive motion practice, and we have a strong reputation for successfully leveraging a preemption defense for our clients.
Particular skill with expert witnesses
Expert witnesses are crucial in life sciences product liability litigation, and our team is skilled at finding, vetting, and preparing top experts in a range of medical, engineering, scientific, and technical fields. In addition to preparing our clients’ expert witnesses to compellingly convey the state of science to judges and juries, we are skilled in excluding or limiting the opposing party’s experts, and in countering theories of medical causation.
Strategic, efficient, cost-effective discovery practice
If not properly controlled, the costs, burdens, and risks surrounding discovery can overshadow the substantive issues involved. Leveraging advanced technology and our in-house Records & E-Discovery team, we collaborate with our clients to create tailored, cost-efficient, reasonable, and defensible plans to respond to the discovery needs of each of their matters. We also pride ourselves on vigorously countering plaintiffs’ overly broad discovery requests.
Integrated appellate team
Where appropriate, our appellate lawyers are crucial members of our unified teams from the outset, strategizing on potential litigation before it is filed, consulting on dispositive trial court motions, formulating key trial arguments, evaluating the merits of an appeal, and then regularly winning those appeals.
Proactive risk management
Forewarned is forearmed. We conduct fixed-fee risk assessments for clients seeking to identify costly liabilities and reduce risk before a potential problem becomes front page news. We can support clients with traditional products, digital health, and AI solutions, and can assist clients:
- Before they even bring a product (or digital or AI solution) to market, when they can still adjust warnings and related promotional materials based on our findings.
- When a potential new risk surfaces for a product marketed by our client or its competitors, when understanding the risks of litigation and available defenses is crucial.
- When they’re considering an Rx-to-OTC switch, as over-the-counter products have more unpredictable litigation potential when compared to prescription products.
- When they’re evaluating the acquisition of a product, either on its own or as part of a corporate merger, and need to understand the litigation risk they would inherit as they consider offer price and indemnification terms.
International reach and EU Product Liability Directive
We have assisted product liability clients in Canada, the UK, the EU, South America, Asia, and Australia with litigation, preventive risk management, crisis procedures, and arbitration under both national and international rules.
In close coordination with our litigation colleagues in our European offices, we have more recently been advising multinational clients on the new EU Product Liability Directive (PLD), which marks a fundamental shift in the product liability landscape for all companies placing products on the EU market. The PLD sits alongside the EU’s new representative actions regime, further increasing the potential exposure for companies operating in the EU.
Broad industry experience and recognition
Our work spans a wide range of medications and devices, including contraceptives and hormone therapies, pelvic and hernia mesh, breast implants, proton pump inhibitors, antacids, diabetes medications, defibrillators, antidepressants, hip implants, diet drugs, vaccines, over-the-counter medicines, heart valves, bone screws, latex gloves, biologics, and many others. We leverage our deep industry knowledge and experience to anticipate challenges and proactively shape the direction of each case.
Our dedication has consistently earned us recognition as one of the top life sciences product liability practices in the United States by publications such as Chambers, The Legal 500, and The American Lawyer. While we appreciate these honors, our greatest satisfaction comes from representing clients like you in this vital industry.
