OBJECTIVES: Most OECD countries employ pricing controls to contain rising health care expenditures. The recent financial crisis has resulted in further pressure to enact more stringent price controls. The purpose of this study is to provide empirical evidence on how price regulations in the OECD affected the adoption speed of new patent-protected pharmaceutical technologies during 1999-2008.  METHODS: We use discrete time duration modelling with parametric and semi-parametric duration dependence to examine how price expectations shape the probability of launch, controlling for competition, market size expectations, firm and molecule heterogeneity across the major OECD markets during 1999-2008. A sub-sample analysis including only EU countries also investigates the impact of price interdependencies and potential firm strategies in launch and pricing decisions.  RESULTS: The empirical analysis suggests there is a statistically significant and robust price and market size effect in the adoption of new pharmaceutical technologies. A unit increase in the log expected launch price and the log of expected market size increases the probability of launch by 0.003 and 0.002 respectively. Concentrated therapeutic subgroups, reflecting market crowding constitutes a significant barrier to entry. Sub-sample findings from the EU market suggest strategic firm behaviour with firms delaying launch in low-priced markets and attempts to maintain price differentials across interdependent markets to a minimum due to price complementarities. Firm economies of scale and the therapeutic importance of innovations are other important drivers of early adoption.  CONCLUSIONS: A significant and robust price and market size effect is observed in the likelihood of new pharmaceutical adoption. Price regulations slow down pharmaceutical adoption on a global scale and may impose welfare losses, particularly when the innovations that are delayed are cost-effective from a societal perspective. Due to scale advantages observed in international roll-out strategies, price controls may increase incentives for mergers and acquisitions, further increasing concentration levels and barriers to entry.