ERS Genomics signs CRISPR deal with Lonza

ERS Genomics has signed a deal with Swiss company Lonza Pharma & Biotech to provide access to CRISPR/Cas9 technology.

ERS, based in Dublin, licenses access to CRISPR/Cas9 gene-editing technology co-owned by French microbiologist Emmanuelle Charpentier.

The non-exclusive licensing agreement was announced in a press release issued yesterday, December 13.

In the statement, ERS said that Lonza will be able to use the technology in its bioproduction products as well as in induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) for research applications. iPSCs are stem cells which can produce any type of cell in the body.

Eric Rhodes, CEO of ERS, described Lonza as “the world’s leading contract manufacturer of biologics” and said that he saw “tremendous potential” for gene-editing to enhance the company’s capabilities in this field.

Financial details of the agreement have not been disclosed.

This is the latest in a series of non-exclusive CRISPR/Cas9 licences granted by ERS this year. In November, LSIPR reported that ERS had licensed its CRISPR/Cas9 patents to DefiniGEN, a spin-out from the University of Cambridge. A similar deal was signed with Belgian biotech start-up Syngulon in October.

ERS is the licensing body for CRISPR/Cas9 patents owned by Charpentier, the University of California and the University of Vienna.

IP for the technology has been fiercely contested in courts. The parties group which licenses their patents to ERS have been embroiled in a legal battle with the Broad Institute of Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

In September, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled in favour of Broad in a case in a dispute over patents covering CRISPR technology.

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