other than calling Gendaq directly, best way IMO to track this sort of question is to search the EPO and PCT databases.......
european-patent-office.org
ep.dips.org
S-1..... boiler plate -- scary, but no mention of Gendaq specifically.....
BECAUSE IT IS DIFFICULT AND COSTLY TO PROTECT OUR PROPRIETARY RIGHTS, AND THIRD
PARTIES HAVE FILED PATENT APPLICATIONS THAT ARE SIMILAR TO OURS, WE CANNOT
ENSURE THE PROPRIETARY PROTECTION OF OUR TECHNOLOGIES AND PRODUCTS.
Our commercial success will depend in part on obtaining patent protection
of our technology and successfully defending these patents against third party
challenges. The patent positions of pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies
can be highly uncertain and involve complex legal and factual questions. No
consistent policy regarding the breadth of claims allowed in biotechnology
patents has emerged to date. Accordingly, we cannot predict the breadth of
claims allowed in patents we own or license.
We are a party to various license agreements that give us rights under
specified patents and patent applications. We currently hold an exclusive
sublicense for ZFP transcription factor technology which is limited to using the
technology in human and animal healthcare. The scope of this license may be
subject to dispute. We may need to license additional rights to commercialize
our technology outside human and animal healthcare. We will seek to obtain a
sublicense to these patent applications for use in our agricultural
biotechnology efforts. If we are not able, however, to license these additional
rights, it could harm our business. Similarly, our current licenses, and our
future licenses will, contain performance obligations. If we fail to meet those
obligations, the licenses could be terminated. If we are unable to continue to
license these technologies on commercially reasonable terms, or at all, we may
be forced to delay or terminate our product development and research activities.
With respect to our present and any future sublicenses, since our rights
derive from those granted to our sublicensor, we are subject to the risk that
our sublicensor may fail to perform its obligations under the master license or
fail to inform us of useful improvements in, or additions to, the underlying
intellectual property owned by the original licensor.
We are unable to exercise the same degree of control over intellectual
property that we license from third parties as we exercise over our internally
developed intellectual property. We generally do not control the prosecution of
patent applications that we license from third parties; therefore, the patent
applications may not be prosecuted in a timely manner.
The degree of future protection for our proprietary rights is uncertain and
we cannot ensure that:
- we or our licensors were the first to make the inventions covered by each
of our pending patent applications;
- we or our licensors were the first to file patent applications for these
inventions;
- others will not independently develop similar or alternative technologies
or reverse engineer any of our products, processes or technologies;
- any of our pending patent applications will result in issued patents;
- any patents issued or licensed to us or our Universal GeneTools
collaborators or strategic partners will provide a basis for commercially
viable products or will provide us with any competitive advantages or
will not be challenged and invalidated by third parties;
- we will develop additional products, processes or technologies that are
patentable; or
- the patents of others will not have an adverse effect on our ability to
do business.
Others have filed and in the future are likely to file patent applications
that are similar to ours. We are aware that there are academic groups and other
companies that are attempting to develop technology which is based on the use of
zinc finger and other DNA binding proteins, and that these groups and companies
have filed patent applications. Several patents have been issued, although
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Sangamo has no current plans to use the associated inventions. More
particularly, we are aware of pending patent applications with claims directed
to zinc finger libraries and methods of designing zinc finger DNA binding
proteins. These applications are not issued patents. If the pending claims were
granted in their present form, however, they could interfere with our right to
commercialize our products and processes. If these or other patents issue, it is
possible that the holder of any patent or patents granted on these applications
may bring an infringement action against our collaborators, strategic partner or
us claiming damages and seeking to enjoin commercial activities relating to the
affected products and processes. The costs of litigating the claim could be
substantial. Moreover, we cannot predict whether our Universal GeneTools
collaborators, strategic partners or we would prevail in any actions. In
addition, if the relevant patent claims were upheld as valid and enforceable and
our products or processes were found to infringe the patent or patents, we could
be prevented from making, using or selling the relevant product or process
unless we could obtain a license or were able to design around the patent
claims. While we believe that our proprietary intellectual property would give
us substantial leverage to secure a cross-license, it is uncertain that any
license required under that patent or patents would be made available on
commercially acceptable terms, if at all. We believe that there may be
significant litigation in the genomics industry regarding patent and other
intellectual property rights which could subject us to litigation. If we become
involved in litigation, it could consume a substantial portion of our managerial
and financial resources.
We have received unsolicited invitations to license existing patented
technology from a number of third parties, at least one of which contained an
allegation of infringement. Upon careful analysis of each of these technologies,
we have determined that we already own rights to these technologies or that our
scientific and commercial interests would not benefit from the acquisition of
rights to these technologies. Further, we believe that the making, using or
selling of our products and processes need not infringe any claims in the
proffered patents. Accordingly, we have declined to enter into license
negotiations with these parties. It is possible, however, that these parties
will bring future actions against us, our Universal GeneTools collaborators or
our strategic partners alleging infringement of their patents. As detailed
above, the outcome of any litigation, particularly lawsuits involving
biotechnology patents, is difficult to predict and likely to be costly
regardless of the outcome. In these circumstances, the risks of a negative
impact on our business can neither be clearly defined nor entirely eliminated. |
