The University of Missouri has reached a confidential settlement with an Indian-origin former professor, Ashim Mitra whom it accused of stealing a student’s research and selling it to a pharmaceutical company, potentially costing the university millions of dollars.

The research helped lead to the development of drug treatment for a condition known as dry eye. The university had alleged that the patents for the drug belonged to the school, not professor Ashim Mitra or his student. The suit claimed that Mitra improperly received $1.5 million from the sale and had the potential of earning $10 million more in royalties from what the university said could be a billion-dollar drug.

Mitra resigned from the UMKC School of Pharmacy in 2019 after being accused of exploiting foreign graduates to perform menial tasks at his home. Scared of being stripped off their visas, the students agreed to do the chores. 

In a statement issued on Monday, the university said it had resolved its claims regarding “Mitra’s interest in the patents confidentially and to its satisfaction.”

“The university has withdrawn and dismissed its claims regarding inventorship and acknowledges the inventors are properly named and that no additional parties should be included as inventors on the patents or patent applications,” the statement said.

Terms of the settlement were not disclosed.

The university said in court documents that Mitra sold the research to Auven Therapeutics Management, a pharmaceutical development company based in the US Virgin Islands, which resold the invention to a company in India called Sun Pharmaceutical Industries for $40 million, plus royalties.

In Monday’s statement, the university said it now acknowledges that “all of the patents and intellectual property rights involved in the action are fully owned by the Sun Pharma group and relate to its Cequa ophthalmic product, approved as a treatment for dry eye.”