Martin Shkreli (yes, that Martin Shkreli) is currently running a virtual screen for additional PCNA inhibitors: https://twitter.com/wagieeacc/status/1687137621699436552
replies(2):
>> Shkreli bought the exclusive rights to manufacture Daraprim, a drug that can treat a rare parasitic disease, in 2015 and hiked the price from $13.50 per pill to $750, to much controversy. The entrepreneur was ordered in January 2022 to return $64.6 million in profit made by the price hikes and creating what the Federal Trade Commission alleged was “a web of anti-competitive restrictions” to prevent rivals from making a cheaper generic version.
https://www.fastcompany.com/90932968/martin-shkreli-dr-gupta...
I am not well-versed in intellectual property (so please correct me if I’m wrong), but in this case Shkreli is using a database of commercially available compounds (ZINC) and a hit present in the screen could be patented. He said he won’t do it, and, since this could be considered prior art, nobody else can do a claim.
Shkreli's main sin is choosing a drug that is primarily used by a specific protected class. It treats parasitic infections that normally don't take hold in people with healthy immune response. Daraprim's customer list is something like 92% AIDS patients, and 8% immuno-compromised for other reasons.
Shkreli did something that happens all the time, and we don't bat an eye. But you don't do it to protected classes without a mob response.