In the order dated May 7, 2026, the Patent Office refused the application under Section 15 of the Patents Act, 1970, after the US company failed to contest pre-grant oppositions filed by civil society groups, and subsequently informed the Patent Office that it wished to abandon the application. ET has seen a copy of the order.
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“This decision is significant as refusal of the patent application means that AbbVie has not been able to obtain secondary patent for the composition of glecaprevir/pibrentasvir, which if granted would have extended AbbVie’s patent monopoly by five years,” said KM Gopakumar, senior researcher and legal advisor at Third World Network.
AbbVie’s patent application was filed in 2018. The company sought protection for a specific bilayer tablet formulation of glecaprevir/pibrentasvir, a highly effective pan-genotypic treatment for Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) infection.
The application did not relate to AbbVie’s original patent on the drug, but to a secondary patent covering its composition and formulation.
Hepatitis C is a liver disease affecting an estimated 35 million people in India.