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11 October 2018Americas

Eli Lilly takes Adocia to court over insulin patents

Eli Lilly has filed a complaint (pdf) against France-based biotechnology company Adocia over patents relating to fast-acting insulin.

The US firm filed the claim at the US District Court for the Southern District of Indiana on Tuesday, October 9. The lawsuit relates to the proper inventorship of two patents.

Eli Lilly’s patents in question are US numbers 9,901,623 and 9,993,555, both of which are called “Rapid-acting insulin compositions” and were issued in 2018.

The patents relate to formulations of insulin or an insulin analogue containing certain concentrations of citrate, either alone or in the presence of the vasodilator treprostinil—which is used in the treatment of pulmonary arterial hypertension.

According to Eli Lilly, fast-acting insulin products enter the bloodstream rapidly to accurately treat short-term spikes in blood sugar caused by eating.

“One approach Eli Lilly pursued to develop fast-acting insulin was structural modification of insulin proteins to make insulin analogues that retain the activity of insulin but have improved pharmacokinetic properties, such as insulin lispro,” said the claim.

According to Eli Lilly, the company began negotiating a collaboration agreement with Adocia to develop an ultra-rapid insulin (URI) product using Adocia’s BioChaperone.

In its claim, Eli Lilly alleged that Adocia’s business is built entirely on formulating existing therapeutic proteins with its BioChaperone technology.

The companies entered into an agreement to develop a URI product based on Eli Lilly’s Humalog ( insulin lispro injection) product formulated with a BioChaperone molecule from Adocia.  

The parties then signed a confidentiality agreement in November 2012. However, this was terminated in July 2013, only for the companies to enter a second confidentiality agreement in December 2013.

This collaboration continued until January 2017, said Eli Lilly.

According to the claim, Adocia has repeatedly alleged that its company’s employees should be listed as inventors of the patents.

“Adocia has alleged that its purported contributions to the pharmaceutical compositions of the patents-in-suit arose during Adocia’s research with BioChaperone molecules as part of the research collaborations between Eli Lilly and Adocia,” said the claim.

The CEO of Adocia allegedly wrote a letter to the president of Eli Lilly demanding that the pharmaceutical company “put in place a document hold prohibiting the destruction of any documents relating to the parties’ collaborations and/or to any other internal or external development project relating to the development of an ultra-rapid insulin product”.

In June 2017 Adocia’s CEO also asked to meet with Eli Lilly to discuss the correction of inventorship over the patents-in-question, which were still at the application stage at the time.

Also in 2017, Adocia filed a US patent application with claims directed to pharmaceutical compositions of insulin with specific concentrations of citrate without requiring a BioChaperone molecule, said the complaint.

According to the complaint, Adocia believes that the patents-in-question actually protect Adocia’s invention, a claim which Eli Lilly argues is incorrect.

In the claim, Eli Lilly said the collaboration was separate to Eli Lilly’s internal programme to develop a URI product using specific concentrations of citrate for a more rapid time-action profile.

Eli Lilly, which is asking the court to recognise that the patents currently name the correct inventors, is seeking damages.

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More on this story

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12 July 2017   The UK Supreme Court has reformulated the three questions that should be asked when testing for equivalent patent infringement.
Americas
12 December 2018   Global pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly has entered into a licence and collaboration agreement with Swiss biotechnology company AC Immune.

More on this story

Big Pharma
12 July 2017   The UK Supreme Court has reformulated the three questions that should be asked when testing for equivalent patent infringement.
Americas
12 December 2018   Global pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly has entered into a licence and collaboration agreement with Swiss biotechnology company AC Immune.