The Supreme Administrative Court decided on Wednesday to grant pharmaceutical company Sopharma exclusive rights for the production of Bulgaria's most popular pain-reliever Analgin (international generic name: Metamizole sodium), confirming its status of sole holder of the Analgin trademark. In the course of five years another pharmaceutical company, Plovdiv-based Biomeda, challenged Sopharma's right to register the trademark. The trademark judgement means that any pharmaceutical company that wishes to make Analgin should request the relevant licence from Sopharma. However, no such requests have been made for the time being. I am a pharmacist, I have been working in drug-production for over 30 years now, and no court decision can shake my internal professional conviction that Analgin cannot be registered as a trademark in Bulgaria,' said Biomeda production director Milan Pargov said. The drug market is very conservative and with this court decision Sopharma is monopolising it and depriving people of choice, he added. In 1998 the court ruled that another popular drug, Validol, cannot be registered as a trademark and may be produced freely by all pharmaceuticals.