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25 September 2020AmericasRory O'Neill

PTAB cancels Imbruvica patent claims in blow for AbbVie

The US Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) has invalidated parts of an AbbVie patent covering blood disease drug Imbruvica (ibrutinib).

The PTAB’s decision comes as a partial victory for Sandoz, the Novartis division that petitioned for the board to review the patent.

In its decision, the PTAB found claims 1 and 6–10, 24, 35, 39, and 55 invalid. These claims cover the dosage of Imbruvica used to treat chronic graft versus host disease (GVHD).

A person of ordinary skill in the art could have used existing prior art to arrive at the conclusions described in these claims, the PTAB found.

But claims covering which GVHD patients would receive Imbruvica (4, 13, 15, 28– 31, 43–46, 50–53) have remained intact.

AbbVie has previously faced accusations of using a “drip feed” of patents to extend the life of its monopoly on Imbruvica.

A report published in July by non-profit I-MAK found that AbbVie has gained more than nine years of extra exclusivity on the drug by obtaining almost 90 patents, with more than 100 applications pending.

More than a third of these patents cover the use of the drug for treating specific diseases, such as GVHD, while 28% cover the active substance in Imbruvica, ibrutinib.

Since its initial approval in 2013, the price of Imbruvica has increased by 57%, with the non-discounted annual price currently standing at $174,156 per person.

“As long as subsequent patents are written specifically enough to be considered outside the scope of disclosure of the first patent(s), the potential to keep stacking additional patents on a single, already patented active substance is limitless,” the I-MAK report argued.

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Americas
20 July 2020   AbbVie has used a “drip feed” of patents to secure more than nine years of extra exclusivity on blood cancer drug Imbruvica, a new report has revealed.

More on this story

Americas
20 July 2020   AbbVie has used a “drip feed” of patents to secure more than nine years of extra exclusivity on blood cancer drug Imbruvica, a new report has revealed.