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Biotech / Medical : Trickle Portfolio -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: tuck who wrote (641)	5/22/2001 11:56:44 AM
From: tuck	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1784

The new horse pulling Trickle is BDAL. This morning's move comes on the back of a big win against ThermoFinnigan. The biggest court date is later on, however, according to the conference call which I covered earlier. If so, maybe we'll get 10 points on that one. >>BILLERICA, Mass., May 21, 2001 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Bruker Daltonics Inc. (NASDAQ: BDAL chart, msgs) announces that the European Patent Office (EPO) in Munich last week revoked Thermo Finnigan's European Patent (EP) 0 202 943 in its entirety. After hearing several witnesses, the EPO found that the `943 patent was invalid because it lacked novelty over both the written prior art and two separate prior public uses at Bell Labs. The `943 patent relates to ion trap mass spectrometry. Thermo Finnigan had sued Bruker Daltonics under this patent in three separate actions in Europe: in Duesseldorf for Germany, in Hamburg for certain other European countries, and in Paris for France. Thermo Finnigan also had previously sued Bruker Daltonics under the corresponding U.S. patent (RE 34,000) at the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC). In 1998, the ITC also found that the asserted claims of the U.S. '000 patent were invalid for three separate reasons, namely anticipation by the prior art, obviousness and failure to disclose the best mode. Finnigan did not appeal the ITC decision on the `000 patent to the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. Surprisingly, Finnigan sued again under the `000 patent in the U.S. District Court in Boston, where their suit recently was consolidated with Bruker Daltonics' antitrust action against Thermo Finnigan and its affiliates. "This EPO decision is yet another major blow against Thermo Finnigan's attempts to keep fair competition out of the ion trap mass spectrometry market," commented Frank H. Laukien, President and CEO of Bruker Daltonics. "It is remarkable that Thermo Finnigan actually sued us in three different venues in Europe after their corresponding U.S. patent was found invalid by the ITC for three separate reasons. The fact that the EPO now has revoked their `943 patent in its entirety certainly raises further questions of whether Thermo Finnigan had a good-faith basis to pursue these suits."<< snip Cheers, Tuck