Covid vaccine patent landscape heats up as Pfizer partner sues Arbutus and Genevant – Endpoints News

The patent landscape around the two main Covid-19 vaccines is becoming more complex and contested by the day.

More recently, Canadian biotech Acuitas sued Arbutus and Genevant, two companies that Acuitas says make baseless claims about being close to the heart of Pfizer and BioNTech and Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccines.

The combination comes as Acuitas’ LNP, or lipid nanoparticle, technology is used to deliver Comirnaty through an established partnership. But the company says “the defendants here, Arbutus and Genevant, had nothing to do with that success,” according to a filing Friday in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

Suffice it to say that Acuitas is not satisfied with the claims of Arbutus and Genevant.

“Arbutus and Genevant seek the benefits from Comirnaty without having borne the brunt of its development. Their claim to rights to – and payment for – Comirnaty is baseless,” Acuitas added in its filing.

The retort is similar to one made by Moderna last week as RNAi giant Alnylam Pharmaceuticals also sued Boston Biotech and Pfizer over similar LNP intellectual property – seeking a “fair royalty” in compensation. Arbutus and Genevant too Moderna sued late last month in Delaware District Court for infringement of patents related to the companies’ nucleic acid particles and lipid vesicles. Arbutus and Genevant also expressed their desire for a “reasonable guarantee” of Moderna’s Spikevax sales.

For his part, a Moderna spokesperson previously said Terminal News “We are satisfied that Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine is not covered by these claims. Moderna is a pioneer in mRNA vaccines, and we have developed our own proprietary LNP delivery technology. »

In Acuitas’ 42-page complaint, the biotech asks the court to rule that Comirnaty does not infringe any valid claims of any of Arbutus’ patents and that the court invalidates the company’s related patents.

Genevant is a partial subsidiary of Roivant Sciences, which owns 84% ​​of Genevant and Arbutus owns the rest. Roivant, the former company of Vivek Ramaswamy, also invested in Arbutus, including a $117 million investment in 2017.

Acuitas said in its filing that Genevant and Arbutus sent letters to Pfizer headquarters in 2020 and 2021 threatening to sue Big Pharma and enforce their patents.


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