--- title: "Which consultants, agencies and distributors served Purdue?" language: en canonical: https://dossiertwist.com/dossiers/purdue-pharma/consultants-and-distributors/ as_of: 2026-10-22 keywords: ["Purdue Pharma L.P.","Purdue Pharma Inc.","OxyContin","Sackler family","Richard Sackler","Pharmaceutical Research Associates L.P.","Beacon Company","Rosebay Medical Company L.P.","The Purdue Frederick Company","Rhodes Pharmaceuticals","Chapter 11","Harrington v. Purdue Pharma L.P.","third-party releases","Knoa Pharma","McKinsey & Company","opioid litigation","guilty plea","Master Disbursement Trust","shareholder settlement","Mundipharma"] --- # Which consultants, agencies and distributors served Purdue? **Question.** Which consultants, advertising agencies, distributors and service providers worked with Purdue Pharma L.P., and what legal consequences did each face? **Answer.** Three wholesalers, Cardinal Health, McKesson and Cencora (formerly AmerisourceBergen), generally accounted for over 90 percent of the gross sales of Purdue Pharma and Rhodes, the debtors said in 2025, and were among Purdue's largest unsecured creditors in 2019; separately, states sued them alongside Purdue over their own conduct. McKinsey worked on 75 engagements for Purdue from 2004 to 2019 and, according to the New York Attorney General, Publicis Health was its advertising agency from 2010 to 2019; each later reached its own settlement with the states, and McKinsey also a federal resolution, paid by the firms themselves, not by Purdue. DOJ's 2020 settlement with members of the Sackler family describes an unnamed consulting company that worked with Purdue on the 2013 E2E sales programme. ## Wholesale distributors: customers and creditors, and co-defendants - Analysis: Purdue sold its prescription products mainly through wholesale distributors. The debtors' disclosure statement of 1 July 2025 says that Purdue Pharma and Rhodes had 40 different customer/distributors but that Cardinal, McKesson and Cencora (formerly Amerisource Bergen) generally accounted for over 90 percent of their gross sales; it describes the chargebacks wholesalers claim from the debtors under the Federal Supply Schedule programs and warns that the successor company would lose its primary sales channel if the distributors refused to deal with it. This is the debtors' commercial description in a risk-factor section, not a statement about the distributors' litigation role. At the petition date the same three groups appeared among Purdue Pharma L.P.'s 50 largest unsecured creditors with claims for "distributor fees": AmerisourceBergen (no. 7, $4,485,373), McKesson Corporation (no. 9, $3,655,581) and Cardinal Health (no. 10, $3,468,979); the list does not state the contracts behind the fees. The federal courts' record of the case also lists the RDC Liquidating Trust, successor to Rochester Drug Co-Operative, Inc., among the creditors, without the nature or amount of its claim. [src-015] [src-001] [src-115] - Analysis: In court the distributors appear in a different capacity, as defendants sued over their own conduct alongside Purdue. Rhode Island's Third Amended Complaint of 22 March 2022 (C.A. No. PC2018-4555) sues McKesson Corporation d/b/a McKesson Drug Company, Cardinal Health, Inc. and AmerisourceBergen Drug Corporation as the "Distributor Defendants", calling them the "big three" that dominate wholesale distribution, and alleges that Purdue and the distributors failed to report suspicious orders; it also alleges, "upon information and belief, based on the reporting of an industry-wide practice", that Purdue — defined there as Purdue Pharma L.P., Purdue Pharma Inc. and The Purdue Frederick Company — paid chargebacks to wholesalers and so learned where its drugs went. These are the State's allegations, not findings. The distributors were sued in their own capacity, a litigation role distinct from their commercial dealings with Purdue, and the debtors' 2025 disclosure statement, for its part, describes chargebacks as a commercial mechanism under Federal Supply Schedule pricing. New York's 2019 complaint also named McKesson, Cardinal Health, AmerisourceBergen Drug Corporation and Rochester Drug Cooperative, and the federal MDL included McKesson among Purdue's co-defendants. The distributors' own cases were resolved separately from Purdue's: the New York Attorney General's release of 1 February 2024 lists McKesson, Cardinal Health and Amerisource Bergen among the companies from which the Attorney General had recovered funds for New York opioid abatement since the 2019 lawsuit, without describing that agreement's terms. [src-055] [src-015] [src-014] [src-062] [src-003] - Documented: The caption of the New York Attorney General's case as reproduced with the Suffolk County court's 2019 letter rogatory names as defendants Purdue Pharma L.P., Purdue Pharma Inc., The Purdue Frederick Company, Inc., The P.F. Laboratories, Inc., Purdue Holdings L.P. (now Pharmaceutical Research Associates L.P.), Rosebay Medical Company L.P., The Beacon Company, PLP Associates Holdings, L.P., ten Doe entities and Richard S., Jonathan D., Mortimer D.A., Kathe A., David A., Beverly and Theresa Sackler and Ilene Sackler Lefcourt, alongside other manufacturers and the distributors McKesson Corporation, Cardinal Health, Inc., AmerisourceBergen Drug Corporation and Rochester Drug Cooperative, Inc. The Attorney General's office described the March 2019 complaint as naming Purdue Pharma and its affiliates, members of the Sackler family and trusts they control among the manufacturers, and the four distributors as distributor defendants. [src-014] [src-062] - Qualification: The distributors were sued as co-defendants in their own capacity as wholesale distributors; that litigation role is separate from their commercial role as Purdue's customers and creditors. - Outcome: The New York Attorney General's release of February 2024 lists McKesson, Cardinal Health and Amerisource Bergen among the companies from which the Attorney General had recovered funds for New York since filing the 2019 lawsuit — each distributor's own resolution, separate from Purdue's. - Documented: Judge Colleen McMahon's decision of 16 December 2021 recounts that from about 2014 new lawsuits were filed against Purdue over its promotion and marketing of OxyContin and that, this time, members of the Sackler family were named as defendants. At the end of 2017, sixty-four federal cases brought by state and local government entities against Purdue and other defendants, including pharmacies, pharmaceutical companies and distributors such as McKesson Corporation, were sent to the National Prescription Opiate Litigation (MDL-2804) in the Northern District of Ohio before Judge Dan A. Polster; about 2,200 actions against Purdue were pending there when Purdue filed for bankruptcy, and over 390 parallel actions were pending in state and local courts. [src-003] - Qualification: The decision uses "Purdue" for Purdue Pharma L.P. and its affiliated debtors; McKesson is mentioned as an example of a co-defendant in the MDL cases, not as a party to Purdue's settlements. ## Other trade creditors in the petition list - Analysis: The petition list of Purdue Pharma L.P.'s largest unsecured creditors also includes Syneos Health, listed as formerly inVentiv Health, with a trade debt of $1,073,469; Purple Strategies LLC of Alexandria, Virginia (no. 39, trade debt $150,000); and Dezenhall Resources of Washington, D.C., with a trade debt whose amount is not cleanly reproduced in the retained copy (it reads "5142485", apparently $142,485). The list gives each claim only as trade debt and does not say what services were provided. [src-001] ## Publicis Health, the advertising agency - Analysis: According to the New York Attorney General, Publicis Health, LLC worked with Purdue Pharma L.P. from 2010 through 2019 as its advertising agency, developing campaigns and materials for OxyContin, Butrans and Hysingla; the Attorney General alleges that its materials promoted OxyContin as safe and unable to be abused, that it implemented Purdue's "Evolve to Excellence" programme developed by McKinsey, and that it conspired with McKinsey & Company, Inc. and Practice Fusion, Inc. to push false and deceptive strategies to increase Purdue's opioid sales. These are the Attorney General's allegations, announced with the settlement and not tested in court. On 1 February 2024 a coalition of every attorney general, co-led by New York's, announced the agreement, described as the first with an advertising agency over the opioid crisis: Publicis Health, part of Publicis Groupe, S.A., was to pay $350 million within 60 days, was barred from accepting future contracts or engagements related to the marketing or sale of opioids, and was to release hundreds of thousands of internal documents on its work for Purdue and other manufacturers and its communications with consultants such as McKinsey and Practice Fusion; New York's share was $19,176,750.60. The terms are known from the release, the consent judgment is not retained, and the payment is Publicis Health's own liability, not Purdue's. [src-062] ## McKinsey & Company in brief - Analysis: McKinsey contracted with Purdue on 75 engagements in the United States between 2004 and 2019, according to the Justice Department, including a 2013 engagement on steps to "turbocharge" OxyContin sales. The firm resolved the attorneys general's investigations through an agreement and consent judgment filed on 4 February 2021 by 47 states, the District of Columbia and five territories, under which it was to provide more than $573 million, and on 13 December 2024 it agreed to pay $650 million to resolve a federal criminal and civil investigation, in a resolution that includes a five-year deferred prosecution agreement; DOJ's release notes that the details in the charging documents and civil resolution are allegations. Those payments are McKinsey's own liability, not Purdue's or the Sackler family's. The engagements, the 2013 board meetings, the charges, McKinsey US's admission and the role of its former senior partner Martin Elling are set out on the page on Purdue and McKinsey. [src-068] [src-060] - Documented: According to the Justice Department's release of 13 December 2024 on the McKinsey resolution, McKinsey contracted with Purdue on 75 different engagements in the United States between 2004 and 2019; after a Purdue affiliate's 2007 guilty plea McKinsey partners maintained close contact with Purdue, worked with it in 2009 to enhance "brand loyalty" for OxyContin, and in 2010 worked with it to obtain FDA approval of a reformulated, abuse-deterrent OxyContin. [src-068] - Qualification: The release summarises the Agreed Statement of Facts filed with the resolution; the statement itself (71 pages) is not retained. - Documented: On 4 February 2021, 47 states, the District of Columbia and five U.S. territories simultaneously filed an agreement and consent judgment with McKinsey & Company resolving the attorneys general's investigations into its work for opioid companies. Under it McKinsey was to provide more than $573 million, minus costs, for opioid abatement (more than $32 million for New York), release tens of thousands of internal documents on its work for Purdue Pharma and other opioid manufacturers, adopt a strict document-retention plan, continue its investigation into allegations that two of its partners tried to destroy documents in response to investigations of Purdue Pharma, implement an ethics code certified annually by all partners, and stop advising companies on Schedule II and III opioid narcotics. [src-060] - Qualification: Terms as described in the New York Attorney General's release; the consent judgment itself is not retained, and the release does not say whether McKinsey admitted the allegations. - Documented: On 13 December 2024 the Justice Department announced that McKinsey & Company Inc. had agreed to pay $650 million to resolve a criminal and civil investigation into its consulting work for Purdue Pharma L.P. on the sales and marketing of OxyContin, including the 2013 engagement on steps to "turbocharge" OxyContin sales: a penalty of over $231 million, a forfeiture of over $93 million (reflecting all money Purdue paid McKinsey from 2004 to 2019) and $2 million to the Virginia Medicaid Fraud Control Unit to resolve the criminal allegations, and over $323 million under a civil settlement of False Claims Act liability. McKinsey also agreed not to do any work related to the marketing, sale, promotion or distribution of controlled substances during the five-year term of the deferred prosecution agreement and to implement a compliance programme; its U.S. subsidiary entered a five-year corporate integrity agreement with HHS-OIG. [src-068] - Qualification: The release notes that the details in the charging documents and civil resolution are allegations; the payments are McKinsey's own liability, not Purdue's or the Sackler family's. - Response: The DOJ records that McKinsey received credit for cooperating with the investigation and for remedial measures, including voluntarily stopping all work on opioid-specific business issues in 2019 and terminating two senior partners, among them Martin Elling, who had communicated about deleting opioid-related documents concerning Purdue. ## The unnamed consulting company in the 2020 DOJ settlement - Analysis: In Addendum A to its 2020 civil settlement agreement with members of the Sackler family (the Named Sacklers), the United States sets out conduct it contends it could prove about a consulting company that the document does not name. That company, it says, had worked for Purdue since about the mid-2000s; on 28 May 2013 Purdue executives signed a contract with it to "conduct a rapid assessment of the underlying drivers of current OxyContin performance" and plan near-term revenue growth, and Richard Sackler had direct communications with the company before and during its work on E2E. Between 18 July and 8 August 2013 the company sent reports to Purdue's CEO, at least two of which reached the board; Richard Sackler arranged a meeting for the board with the company without Purdue executives, and on 23 August 2013 certain of the Named Sacklers examined its "unvarnished" findings; E2E was then overseen by the company and some of Purdue's top executives through an Executive Oversight Team and a Project Management Office. These are contentions, not findings: the agreement states that it is not an admission of liability and that the Named Sacklers expressly deny the allegations, and under it they agreed to pay the United States $225,000,000 plus interest, which the debtors' 2025 disclosure statement describes as already paid to the DOJ outside the plan. [src-004] [src-015] - Analysis: The addendum also states that in 2013 the consulting company told Purdue and its board that the retail channel was under intense scrutiny, with wholesalers stopping shipments to an increasing number of pharmacies and imposing hard quantity limits, and proposed an "alternative model for how patients receive OxyContin" that would bypass retail through a third-party vendor. According to the United States, on 16 and 18 August 2013 Mortimer D.A. Sackler asked Purdue's CEO about a new distribution system and a complementary business, Richard Sackler replied that he had had the same idea, the Named Sacklers then approved E2E, and in 2015 Purdue — "the company" in the addendum's wording — entered agreements with three specialty pharmacies for Hysingla. The addendum names neither the consulting company nor the pharmacies, and the Named Sacklers deny these allegations. [src-004] - Analysis: Whether the unnamed company was McKinsey is an inference, not a statement of either source. The Justice Department's December 2024 release on McKinsey describes a matching engagement: it says that in May 2013 Purdue retained McKinsey to conduct a rapid assessment of the drivers of OxyContin performance in the words the addendum quotes from the 28 May 2013 contract, that the 2013 effort was called E2E, and that after an August 2013 meeting with family members on the board a McKinsey partner reported a "ringing endorsement" of "moving forward fast", the phrase the addendum quotes from the consulting company's partners; New York's 2021 complaint also attributes the 2013 plan implemented as E2E to McKinsey. Neither DOJ document says expressly that the addendum's company is McKinsey, so the addendum's statements are kept here as statements about an unnamed consulting company. [src-004] [src-068] ## Sources - [src-015] Court record source · src-015 - [src-001] Purdue's notice of suggestion of bankruptcy and automatic stay, with the Chapter 11 petition of Purdue Pharma L.P. (Commonwealth of Massachusetts v. Purdue Pharma L.P.), Commonwealth of Massachusetts (Office of the Attorney General), 2019-09-16 - [src-115] GovInfo United States Courts opinions record for case 19-23649, Purdue Pharma L.P., U.S. Government Publishing Office (GovInfo) - [src-055] Court record source · src-055 - [src-014] Court record source · src-014 - [src-062] New York Attorney General press release: $350 million from Publicis for its role in the opioid crisis, Office of the New York State Attorney General, 2024-02-01 - [src-003] Memorandum decision and order of Judge Colleen McMahon vacating the confirmation order, In re Purdue Pharma L.P., S.D.N.Y. 21-cv-7532 (CM) (master case; filed as Document 148 in related case 7:21-cv-07585), Office of the Connecticut Attorney General, 2021-12-16 - [src-068] DOJ press release: resolution of criminal and civil investigations into McKinsey & Company's work for Purdue, U.S. Department of Justice, 2024-12-13 - [src-060] New York Attorney General press release: more than $573 million from McKinsey & Company, Office of the New York State Attorney General, 2021-02-04 - [src-004] Settlement agreement between the United States and the Named Sacklers, with addenda, U.S. Department of Justice, 2020-10