On 13 July 2026, the UK and Switzerland announced the conclusion of negotiations for an enhanced Free Trade Agreement (“FTA”) (see here and here). At the time of writing, the final treaty text has not yet been published, and the analysis below is based on the information released by the UK and Swiss Governments announcing the conclusion of negotiations. While the agreement covers a broad range of trade and economic issues and much of the immediate commentary has focused on market access for goods and services and trade facilitation measures, the agreement also contains commitments relating to pharmaceutical exclusivities, including provisions concerning Supplementary Protection Certificates (“SPCs”) and Regulatory Data Protection (“RDP”). Our discussion below focuses specifically on these provisions.
More generally, several substantive and procedural provisions are based on the European Patent Convention (EPC). This applies particularly to the patentability of second and further medical uses, exclusions from patentability and certain requirements relating to the patent-grant procedure. Both parties also clarify that the importation of a patented product may not, for that reason alone, be treated as insufficient working of the patent.
In practical terms, the agreement does not materially expand the UK’s pharmaceutical exclusivities. Instead, it reinforces existing protections, including the SPC framework (which can extend effective patent protection by up to five years, plus a possible six-month paediatric extension, thereby partly compensating for the period during which the patented product could not be marketed because of the mandatory authorisation procedure), and the UK’s current 8+2(+1) RDP regime. Where undisclosed test data are submitted to the competent authorities for the authorisation of medicinal products for human or veterinary use, plant protection products or biocidal products, those data must be protected against unfair commercial use and disclosure. Both Switzerland and the UK provide at least eight years of data protection for pharmaceutical products, ten years for plant protection and biocidal products, and thirteen years for low-risk plant protection products. Pharmaceutical products and veterinary medicinal products are also granted two years of market exclusivity during which period other applicants may rely on the data but may not yet place their product on the market.
The significance therefore lies not so much in the duration of protection, but in the fact that elements of the UK’s pharmaceutical exclusivity framework have been embedded within an international trade agreement. These periods go beyond international minimum standards and the UK’s commitments in previous FTAs.
Historically, pharmaceutical exclusivity regimes have been matters of domestic legislative and regulatory policy. Governments have generally retained broad discretion to amend exclusivity periods in response to shifting healthcare priorities, industrial strategies or political objectives. By incorporating elements of its pharmaceutical exclusivity framework into an international trade agreement, the UK has effectively increased the legal and political cost of future reform. Any proposal to reduce those protections would no longer be solely a matter of domestic policy; it would also need to be assessed against the UK’s international commitments.
For innovative pharmaceutical companies, that distinction may be particularly important. Pharmaceutical investment decisions are made over lengthy development cycles and against a backdrop of significant regulatory uncertainty. Treaty-level commitments can provide an additional degree of predictability by reducing the risk of material policy changes during the life of an investment. Viewed in that context, the pharmaceutical IP provisions may be as significant as an investment certainty measure as they are as an intellectual property commitment.
That certainty may be particularly valuable at a time when a new and stricter pharmaceutical exclusivity framework has been adopted in the EU. Against that backdrop, the UK’s decision to preserve its existing exclusivity framework through an international agreement may be viewed as providing an additional degree of stability for innovative pharmaceutical companies making long-term R&D, licensing and investment decisions.
The agreement also reflects the growing importance of non-patent exclusivities within the life sciences sector. While patents remain the foundation of pharmaceutical protection, regulatory exclusivities increasingly play a central commercial role. RDP and orphan exclusivity frequently determine the timing of competitive entry and can be as commercially significant as patent rights themselves. Although the official announcements do not specifically mention orphan exclusivity, the inclusion of RDP commitments in a trade agreement demonstrates the extent to which these regulatory rights are now recognised as core components of the innovation framework rather than merely supplementary protections. This may be particularly significant given that RDP has traditionally been discussed as part of medicines regulatory policy rather than trade policy. Its inclusion in the agreement suggests that pharmaceutical exclusivities are increasingly being viewed as trade assets in their own right.
More broadly, the agreement may offer an indication of the direction of travel for future trade negotiations. Switzerland’s position as a global pharmaceutical research hub makes pharmaceutical IP a natural area of focus in bilateral discussions. Switzerland has been vigorously defending this position both in the WTO as well as in previous free trade agreements (and ongoing negotiations), not least in the Trade Economic Partnership Agreement (“TEPA“) between EFTA and India where discussions on RDP were launched soon after TEPA came into effect. If similar provisions begin to appear in future UK trade agreements, however, we may see a gradual internationalisation of pharmaceutical exclusivity frameworks. The agreement may therefore provide a template for future UK trade negotiations, particularly with jurisdictions that have significant life sciences sectors or place a premium on pharmaceutical innovation. Issues that were once debated primarily as matters of domestic health and innovation policy could increasingly become subjects of international economic diplomacy.
The key takeaway is therefore not that pharmaceutical exclusivity has expanded, but that it has become more firmly embedded within the UK’s international legal framework. For life sciences companies, that increased certainty may be just as valuable as any extension of exclusivity itself. For lawyers, it is a reminder that the future of pharmaceutical protection will increasingly sit at the intersection of intellectual property, regulation, industrial policy and international trade.
