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12 September 2019GeneticsRory O'Neill

University of Columbia and Illumina locked in DNA patent battle

The  University of Columbia has hit  Illumina with a patent infringement suit relating to next-generation DNA sequencing, just days after the pharmaceutical company had one of the university’s patents invalidated at the US Patent and Trial Appeal Board (PTAB).

In the  suit, filed at the US District Court for the District of Delaware on Wednesday, September 10, the trustees of the university said that Illumina sold DNA sequencing instruments, including the HiSeq X Ten system, which directly infringed two of the university’s patents.

The two patents (US numbers 10,407,458 and 10,407,459), both entitled “massive parallel method for decoding DNA and RNA”, cover modified versions of nucleotides and methods of using them to sequence DNA.

“DNA sequencing—ie, determining the order of the nucleotides in a DNA strand—is of enormous importance for a wide variety of applications in medicine, biotechnology, and other fields,” the complaint said.

The DNA sequences methods claimed by Columbia’s patents come under the next generation sequencing (NGS) technologies.

The university is seeking enhanced damages for what it called Illumina’s “willful infringement” of its patents.

Columbia’s suit came one day after the Patent Trial and Appeal Board invalidated another one of the university’s patents related to the technology, following a petition from Illumina.

According to the PTAB, two claims of that patent (US number 9,868,985 B2) were obvious due to prior art.

The decision followed an inter partes review of the patent, requested by Illumina.

In the ruling, the PTAB found that Illumina had proven by a “preponderance of evidence” that claims 1 and 2 of the ‘985 patent were unpatentable.

According to the PTAB, a person of ordinary skill in the art would have pursued the patent’s claimed method.


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29 October 2020   St. Louis-based Washington University has won more than $31.6 million from a patent victory over the University of Wisconsin’s technology transfer office.

More on this story

Americas
29 October 2020   St. Louis-based Washington University has won more than $31.6 million from a patent victory over the University of Wisconsin’s technology transfer office.