Item 1. Legal Proceedings
Item 1. Legal Proceedings
Securities class action and derivative lawsuits
On March 6, 2019, plaintiff William Fabbri filed a lawsuit against Inogen, Scott Wilkinson, and Alison Bauerlein, in the United States District Court for the Central District of California on behalf of a purported class of purchasers of our securities. On March 21, 2019, plaintiff Steven Friedland filed a substantially similar lawsuit against the same defendants in the same court. On May 20, 2019, the court issued an order consolidating the two lawsuits under the name In re Inogen, Inc. Sec. Litig., No. 2:19-cv-01643-FMO-AGR, appointing Dr. John Vasil and Paragon Fund Management as lead plaintiffs, and appointing Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd LLP and Glancy Prongay & Murray LLP as lead plaintiffs’ counsel. On July 10, 2019, the lead plaintiffs filed a consolidated amended complaint on behalf of a purported class of purchasers of our common stock between November 8, 2017 and May 7, 2019. The complaint generally alleges that the defendants failed to disclose that: (i) Inogen had overstated the true size of the total addressable market for its portable oxygen concentrators and had misstated the basis for its calculation of the total addressable market; (ii) Inogen had falsely attributed its sales growth to the strong sales acumen of its sales force, rather than to deceptive sales practices; (iii) the growth in Inogen’s domestic business-to-business sales to home medical equipment providers was inflated, unsustainable and was eroding direct-to-consumer sales; and (iv) Inogen’s decision to focus on sales over rentals of portable oxygen concentrators harmed its ability to serve the Medicare market, in violation of sections 10(b) and 20(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. The complaint seeks compensatory damages in an unspecified amount, costs and expenses, including attorneys’ fees and expert fees, prejudgment and post-judgment interest and such other relief as the court deems proper. O n January 2, 2020, the court dismissed the consolidated amended complaint with leave to amend. On January 9, 2020, the plaintiffs filed a second amended complaint generally alleging substantially similar claims as those in the previous complaint. On January 23, 2020, the defendants filed a motion to dismiss the second amended complaint. On September 2, 2020, the court denied the defendants’ motion to dismiss without prejudice and instructed defendants to file another motion to dismiss if the parties are unable to resolve the issues relating to the second amended complaint. We filed its motion to dismiss on October 28, 2020. On August 13, 2021, the court granted Defendants’ motion to dismiss, and on September 27, 2021, the court entered judgment dismissing the action in its entirety.
On June 26, 2019, plaintiff Twana Brown filed a shareholder derivative lawsuit against Inogen, Scott Wilkinson, Alison Bauerlein, Benjamin Anderson-Ray, Scott Beardsley, R. Scott Greer, Raymond Huggenberger, Heath Lukatch, Loren McFarland, and Heather Rider in the United States District Court for the Central District of California. The complaint purports to bring claims on behalf of Inogen against the individual defendants for breaches of their fiduciary duties as directors and/or officers of Inogen, unjust enrichment, waste of corporate assets and violations of section 14(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. The complaint generally alleges similar claims to the securities class action. The complaint seeks compensatory damages and restitution in an unspecified amount, changes to our corporate governance and internal procedures, costs and expenses, including attorneys’ fees and expert fees, and such other relief as the court deems proper. On August 5, 2019, the court issued an order staying the derivative action pending the resolution of the motion to dismiss stage in In re Inogen, Inc. Sec. Litig . Between October 7, 2019 and October 31, 2019, three additional shareholder derivative complaints were filed in the United States District Court for the Central District of California based on similar factual allegations. These lawsuits purport to bring claims on behalf of Inogen for breach of fiduciary duty, unjust enrichment, waste of corporate assets, insider trading and misappropriation of information, and violations of section 14(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. On January 13, 2020, the court consolidated the four derivative lawsuits before it under the name In re Inogen, Inc. S’holder Deriv. Litig. , Lead Case No. 2:19-cv-5568-FMO-AGR and ordered that the consolidated action be stayed pending the resolution of the motion to dismiss stage in In re Inogen, Inc., Sec. Litig. The parties are currently engaged in discussions regarding future proceedings in this action.
On September 13, 2019, plaintiff Dustin Weller filed a shareholder derivative lawsuit against Inogen, Scott Wilkinson, Alison Bauerlein, Benjamin Anderson-Ray, Scott Beardsley, R. Scott Greer, Raymond Huggenberger, Heath Lukatch, Loren McFarland, and Heather Rider in the United States District Court for the District of Delaware captioned Weller v. Wilkinson, et al. , No. 1:19-cv-01723-MN. On October 17, 2019, plaintiff Sharokh Soltanipour filed a shareholder derivative lawsuit against the same defendants in the same court, captioned Soltanipour v. Wilkinson, et al. , No. 1:19-cv-1968-MN. The complaints generally allege similar claims to those in In re Inogen, Inc., S’holder Deriv. Litig. The complaints purport to bring claims on behalf of Inogen for breach of fiduciary duty, unjust enrichment, waste of corporate assets, abuse of control, gross mismanagement, insider selling and misappropriation of information, violations of section 14(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, and for contribution from certain of the individual defendants. The complaints seek compensatory damages in unspecified amounts, changes to our corporate governance and internal procedures, return of compensation, disgorgement of profits from sale of stock, costs and expenses, including attorneys’ fees and expert fees, and such other relief as the court deems proper. On May 15, 2020, the court consolidated the two derivative lawsuits before it under the name In re Inogen, Inc. S’holder Deriv. Litig., Lead Case No. 1:19-cv-01723-MN-JLH. On July 8, 2020, the court ordered that the consolidated action be stayed pending the resolution of the motion to dismiss in the securities class action, In re Inogen, Inc., Sec. Litig. On November 3, 2021, the court approved the parties’ stipulation to voluntarily dismiss the Delaware derivative action without prejudice.
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Department of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services lawsuit
On September 21, 2020, we filed a lawsuit against defendants, Alex M. Azar, Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), in his official capacity, Seema Verma, Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), in her official capacity and Palmetto GBA, LLC. The lawsuit seeks to invalidate the defendants’ arbitrary and capricious decision to retract a valid HCPCS code to Inogen’s TAV, thereby eliminating reimbursements for the ventilator, in violation of the Administrative Procedures Act (5 U.S.C. §§ 551 , et seq. ). Further, CMS’s failure to provide notice and the opportunity to comment on a change in HCPCS code verification for the Sidekick TAV and similar devices constitutes a violation of the procedural right provided under the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. §§ 1395hh(a)(2)), and Inogen’s due process rights. On June 17, 2021, the United States District Court for the District of Columbia issued an order to deny our motion for a preliminary injunction and dismissed the complaint stating that we had failed to present its claim to CMS and exhaust our administrative remedies. We do not intend to appeal the court order or pursue additional alternatives to meet the Medicare reimbursement coding requirements. Therefore, we adjusted our recognized revenue estimates for the fair value of the earnout liability and evaluated the relevant long-lived asset grouping for impairment.
Other litigation
In the normal course of business, we are from time to time involved in various legal proceedings or potential legal proceedings, including matters involving employment, product liability and intellectual property. We carry insurance, subject to specified deductibles under our policies, to protect against losses from certain liabilities and costs. At this time, we do not anticipate that any of these proceedings arising in the normal course of business will have a material adverse effect on our business. Regardless of the outcome, litigation can have an adverse impact on us because of defense and settlement costs, diversion of management resources, and other factors.
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