TKT victorious

On October 21, the UK's House of Lords ruled that the version of erythropoietin (EPO) developed by Transkaryotic Therapies (TKT), of Cambridge, Massachusetts, does not infringe the patent of the drug's originator, Amgen of S. San Francisco, California. Previously, the UK Patents Court had declared that TKT infringed on Amgen's patent, a ruling that was later reversed by the Court of Appeal in 2002 and which the House of Lords has now upheld, leaving TKT free to market its version of EPO in the UK (see Nat. Biotechnol. 20, 863–865, 2002). TKT's endogenous gene activation technology was not covered by Amgen's patent, said the Court of Appeal in a previous ruling, although Amgen's original patent itself was valid. In a surprise ruling, and a blow for Amgen, however, the House of Lords has also reversed the decision to consider Amgen's patent valid because it was too broad.. “Biotech companies have to be very careful in how they define their inventions, especially if they are claiming around a DNA sequence,” comments Pen ny Gilbert, a partner in the Biopharma Group at Bristows, a specialist IP law company in London. Such a case shows that technology is running ahead of patent law, and the Lords' ruling is an attempt to catch up, she adds. The ruling demonstrates that companies developing their own technologies to produce biologics, could get around some of the older patents. SA

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